;«.        V 

vi-^M^ 


f'««- 


LIBRARY 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 


OF" 


Mrs.  SARAH  P.  WALS  WORTH. 

Received  October,  1894. 
Accessions  No  .  5*7*1  *5~*y  .      Class  A/b  . 


i 


NOAH  AND  HIS  TIMES : 


EMBRACING    THE 


CONSIDERATION  OF  VARIOUS  INQUIRIES 


RELATIVE    TO    THE 


ANTEDILUVIAN  AND  EARLIER  POSTDILUVIAN 
PERIODS, 


WITH     DISCUSSIONS     OF    SEVERAL     OF     THE     LEADING 
QUESTIONS   OF    THE    PRESENT    DAY. 


BY     THE 

REV.   J.   MUNSON   OLMSTEAD,  M.  A. 

AUTHOR   OF   "THOUGHTS    AND    COUNSELS  FOR   THE  IMPENITENT," 
"OUR    FIRST    MOTHER,"    ETC. 


BOSTON: 
GOULD      AND      LINCOLN, 

59    WASHINGTON    STREET. 
1854. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress  in  the  year  1853,  by 

J.   MUNSON  OLMSTEAD, 
In  the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  District  of  Massachusetts. 


DAM  RE  I,  L    &    MOORE,     PRJMTKES. 


PREFACE. 


THE  difficulties  connected  with  the  writing  of  the  fol- 
lowing work  were  so  fully  anticipated  by  the  author,  that 
not  until  some  time  after  a  demand  in  this  day  for  one  of 
the  kind  was,  in  conversation  with  some  literary  and 
Christian  friends,  insisted  on,  and  himself  warmly  urged 
to  undertake  it,  could  he  obtain  his .  own  consent  to 
engage  in  the  effort.  No  contemporaneous  historic  pen 
had  left  aught  concerning  the  period  to  be  surveyed  —  a 
period  of  almost  a  thousand  years,  and  lying  back  near 
the  beginning  of  time  —  commencing  with  the  year  of 
the  world  1056,  and  extending  to  2006  ;  and  the  sum 
of  what  the  pen  o£  inspiration  had  afterward  recorded, 
was  comprised  within  the  compass  of  a  few  short  chapters. 
A  large  portion  too  of  the  subjects  soliciting  investigation 
were  intrinsically  difficult  to  be  handled.  If,  in  the  great 
absence  of  historic  detail,  it  migjit  be  thought  that  the 
investigations  and  discoveries  of  modern  science  could 


17  PEEFACE. 

yield  important  aids  —  as  indeed  justly  it  might  —  yet 
the  writer  could  not  but  be  aware  that  even  those  aids 
would  not  be  rendered  available  without  a  large  measure 
of  labor  and  research.  He  had  previously  written  a 
work  bearing  on  a  proximate  prior  period,  and  therefore, 
it  might  be  said,  was  experimentally  aware  of  the  ob- 
stacles to  be  met  with  in  the  composition  of  such  a  work. 

The  consideration  that  to  a  large  number  of  minds  the 
field  lay  in  a  territory  almost  utterly  unknown,  and,  as 
respects  other  minds,  over  and  around  which  error  on  the 
one  hand  and  skepticism  on  the  other  hovered,  at  length 
brought  him  to  the  determination  to  commence,  and 
impelled  him  to  prosecute  to  completion,  the  undertaking. 

The  subjects  more  largely  discussed,  are  the  Deluge,  in 
that  variety  of  aspect  in  which  it  is  to  be  contemplated  ; 
the  statutory  Death  Penalty  ;  the  Shinaric  occurrences  ; 
and  the  question  as  to  the  Unity  or  Plurality  of  the  Hu- 
man Races.  As  to  the  first  of  these,  viz.  the  Noachic 
Deluge,  —  of  the  various  inquiries  instituted,  those  which 
have  more  than  others  engaged  the  author's  attention, 
relate  to  the  reality  and  modus  of  the  occurrence ;  the 
existence  or  absence  of  Physical  Evidence  of  the  Scrip- 
turally  narrated  event  —  involving  the  question  respect- 
ing the  Epoch  of  Creation  ;  —  together  with  the  Extent 
of  that  Inundation.  In  regard  to  the  second,  that  is,  the 
statutory  Death  Penalty,  never,  it  must  be  confessed, 


PREFACE.  V 

was  there  a  more  urgent  call  than  now  for  the  presenta- 
tion of  correct  views  upon  it.  As  to  the  Shinaric  oc- 
currences, these  involve  matters  of  no  small  interest, 
especially  in  relation  to  Language,  and  the  Settlement, 
locally,  of  mankind  over  the  Earth's  surface.  And  the 
Question  relative  to  the  Unity  or  Plurality  of  ancestral 
origin  of  the  Varieties  of  Humankind  never  before  en- 
listed such  a  degree  of  interest  as  at  present.  What  is 
regarded  as  adding  peculiar  moment  to  this  latter  ques- 
tion is  the  manner  in  which  important  Scriptural  doctrines 
will  be  affected,  according  to  its  decision  one  way  or  the 
other. 

Of  the  various  other  matters  treated  in  the  volume  — 
as  to  most  of  them,  briefly  indeed  —  it  is  not  deemed 
requisite  here  to  make  mention,  inasmuch  as  they  are 
particularly  specified  both  in  the  Table  of  Contents,  and 
at  the  head  of  the  several  pages  of  the  work.  The 
reader  will  naturally  cast  his  eye  over  the  former  ere  he 
proceeds  to  the  perusal  of  the  book.  The  writer  cannot 
but  entertain  the  belief  that  those  who  do  this  will  have 
some  desire  to  see  what  is  said  concerning  them  hi  the 
body  of  the  volume. 

The  aids  which  in  the  investigation  of  the  topics  dis- 
cussed were  received  from  other  authors  have  been  in 
some  form  indicated  in  their  proper  places  in  the  work. 
His  facilities  for  examination  of  the  best  authorities, 


Yl  PREFACE. 

before  and  during  the  composition  of  the  volume,  were 
not  inconsiderable,  and  he  cannot  but  feel  grateful  for  the 
free  access  to  those  of  them  belonging  not  to  his  collec- 
tion, which  was  so  generously  afforded. 

THE  AUTHOR. 
NOVEMBER   15,   1853. 


CONTENTS. 


INTRODUCTION, 13 


EVENING  FIRST. 

Import  of  the  name  Noah  —  Why  the  name  given  —  Noah's  Contem- 
poraries—  The  Antediluvian  Events  he  witnessed  —  Genealo- 
gical Table  of  Patriarchs  from  the  Creation  to  the  Deluge  — 
Antediluvian  Puberty  —  A  prominent  Event  of  Enos's  day  — 
What  its  character  —  The  names  of  the  Patriarchs  expressive,..  16 


EVENING   SECOND. 

• 
Enoch's  Translation  —  Its  influence  —  Doctrine  of  a  Future  State 

—  When  Noah   became  pious  — The  Cainite  Line  — Nominal 
Similarities  —  The  Cainite  Lamech  —  Antediluvian  Arts, 28 


EVENING  THIRD, 

Antediluvian  Arts,  continued— The  State  of  Science  — Inquiry  as 
to  the  origin  of  Alphabetic  Writing  — Date  of  the  Sabbatic  In- 
stitution,   •  41 


Vlll  CONTENTS. 

EVENING   FOURTH. 

Who  the  "  sons  of  God  "  spoken  of  in  Gen.  6:  2  —  Who  the  Giants  in 
Gen.  6  :  4  —  Increasing  Degeneracy  —  Mournful  Corruption  — 
Unrestrained  Violence  —  This  state  how  caused  —  The  Divine 
Displeasure  excited  —  "The  Lord  repented,"  its  meaning,....  56 


EVENING    FIFTH. 

The  Divine  Resolve  —  The  Command  given  to  Noah  —  Children  of 
the  Patriarch  —  Order  of  the  birth  of  the  Three  sons  —Amount 
of  Antediluvian  Population  —  A  strange  Conceit  —  Characteris- 
tics of  the  Patriarch  —  Import  of  1  Peter  3 :  19,  20, 71 

EVENING   SIXTH. 

The  Patriarch's  Fidelity  — The  Ark— Its  Dimensions  —  Of  what 
constructed — Where  built  —  Its  particular  Construction  —  How 
long  in  building —  "  Noah's  Carpenters  "  —  Date  of  Naval  Ar- 
chitecture —  The  warning,  how  promulgated  —  Righteous,  how 
many  —  A  Curious  Story, . 80 


EVENING    SEVENTH. 

Distrust  of  Geology  unreasonable  —  Science  and  Scripture  harmoni- 
ous—  The  Ark  entered  —  The  Noachic  Deluge  begun  —  At 
what  Time  of  the  year  —  Circumstances  recounted  —  The  ungod- 
ly, how  affected  —  The  melancholy  Scene  —  The  Patriarch's 
Emotions  —  Infidel  Cavil  —  The  Dispensation  not  unrighteous, . .  98 


EVENING    EIGHTH. 

The  Form  of  Prayer  ascribed  to  the  Patriarch  —  Noah  how  occupied 
in  the  Ark  — The  Eight  why  preserved  —  Genesis  real  History 
—  Remarks  on  right  Interpretation  —  Traditional  Evidence  of 
the  Noachian  Deluge, 110 


CONTENTS.  IX 

EVENING  NINTH. 

Traditional  Evidence  of  the  Noachic  Deluge,  continued  —  Remarks 
on  Proof  from  Tradition  —  Mythological  Evidence  —  The  Apa- 
mcs.ii  Medals  —  Additional  Memorials, 123 

EVENING   TENTH. 

Inquiry  as  to  Physical  Evidence  of  the  Flood  of  Genesis  —  Theories 
and  Geological  Facts  considered, 136 

EVENING   ELEVENTH. 

Inquiry  as  to  Physical  Evidence  of  the  Flood  of  Genesis,  contin- 
ued —  Theories  and  Geological  Facts  considered, 149 

EVENING   TWELFTH. 

Facts  as  to  Drift,  etc.  —  The  forementioned  Facts  and  Gen.  1:1,2 
not  in  conflict  —  Inquiry  as  to  Physical  Evidence  of  the  Noachic 
Deluge,  concluded, 161 

EVENING    THIRTEENTH. 
On  the  Extent  of  Noah's  Flood, 174 

EVENING   FOURTEENTH. 

On  the  Extent  of  Noah's  Flood,  continued  —  Call  for  the  Dis- 
cussion,   187 

EVENING   FIFTEENTH. 

The  Flood  of  Genesis  produced  not  solely  by  Natural  Causes —  In- 
quiry as  to  the  Ark's  Resting  place, 200 

EVENING   SIXTEENTH. 

Inquiry  as  to  the  Ark's  Resting  place,  continued  — Egress  from  the 
Ark  — Earth's  altered  appearance  —  Legend  of  the  Seven  Sleep- 


CONTENTS. 

ers  —  A  striking  Allegory  —  Remarkable  Transition  —  The 
grateful  Return  —  The  Altar  and  Sacrifice  —  Character  of  the 
Oblation  —  The  Sacrificial  Rite,  its  Rise  and  Design, 212 


EVENING   SEVENTEETH. 

The  Sacrificial  Rite,  its  Rise  and  Design,  continued,  —  The  Precept 
in  Gen.  9:  1  —  The  Dominion  of  Dread  —  Grant  of  Animal 
Food— Why  this  Grant  — The  Specified  Restriction  —  The 
Eating  of  Blood  prohibited  —  Wherefore  the  Prohibition,....  224 

EVENING  EIGHTEENTH. 

The  Eating  of  Blood,  wherefore  prohibited  —  Exaction  for  Blood- 
shedding  —  The  Statutory  Death  Penalty 236 


EVENING   NINETEENTH. 
The  Statutory  Death  Penalty,  continued, 248 

EVENING   TWENTIETH. 
The  Statutory  Death  Penalty,  continued, 259 

EVENING   TWENTY-FIRST. 

The  Statutory  Death  Penalty,  continued  —  The  Flood  of  Noah  not 
to  reappear  —  The  Covenant  against  it  —  The  Bow  of  Promise  — 
The  Occupation  entered  upon  —  The  Planting  of  the  Vine- 
yard —  The  alleged  Sin  of  the  Patriarch, 271 

EVENING  TWENTY-SECOND. 

Carpings  of  Skepticism  —  The  Patriarch's  Predictions  —  At  what 
Time  uttered  —  Names  of  the  Three  Sons  prophetic  —  Advan- 
tages from  the  Past— "The  Seven  Precepts  " —Approach  to 
a  new  Era  —  Increase  of  Numbers 284 


CONTENTS.  XI 

EVENING   TWENTY-THIRD. 

Extending  of  Settlement  —  The  Land  of  Shinar  entered  — The  Phrase 
"From  the  East"  considered  —  Additional  as  to  the  Ark's 
Resting  place  —  The  View  of  Adelung  —  Date  of  Migration 
to  Shinar  —  What  the  name  "  Peleg  "  indicates  —  Query  as  to 
the  Immigrants — Whether  All  or  only  Part  of  the  Noachidae 
entered  Shinar  —  The  Unity  of  the  Shinaric  Band  not  long  to 
remain  unbroken, 294 

\. 

EVENING   TWENTY-FOURTH. 

Inquiry  as  to  the  Primitive  Language  —  Concerning  the  Origin  of 
Language  — Abuse  of  Linguistic  Unity  —  Divine  Determination 
against  the  Return  of  Antediluvian  Wickedness  —  Ambitious 
Aspirations  at  Shinar  —  The  Tower  of  Babel,  why  erected, 308 

EVENING  TWENTY-FIFTH. 

The  Babelic  Tower,  its  Design  — Size  and  Form  of  the  Tower  — 
Character  of  the  Act  of  the  Babel  Builders  —  Inference  relative 
to  the  Patriarch  —  Who  were  the  Builders — Who  dissented 
from  the  Enterprise  —  The  Divine  Interference  —  The  Confusion 
of  Tongues:  Inquiry  as  to  its  Character, 321 

EVENING   TWENTY-SIXTH. 

The  Confusion  of  Tongues  :  Inquiry  as  to  its  Character,  continued  — 
Historic  Notices  and  Traditions  of  the  Events  at  Babel  — The 
Chieftain  Nimrod  —  Genealogical  Table  of  Postdiluvian  Patri- 
archs to  the  time  of  Abraham  —  Concerning  Date  of  Events, 
Amount  of  Population,  etc., 333 

EVENING   TWENTY-SEVENTH. 

References  to  Decree  of  Distribution  —  The  Idea  of  a  Previous 
Division — The  Dispersion  considered  —  Geographical  Settle- 
ment of  Tribes  or  Families  —  A.  Descendants  of  Japheth  — B. 
Descendants  of  Ham  — C.  Descendants  of  Shem, 346 


Xll  CONTENTS. 

EVENING    TWENTY-EIGHTH. 

Descent  of  all  Mankind  from  Noah ;  or  the  Unity  of  the  Human 
Races  —  The  Five  Varieties  of  Blumenbach,  viz. :  the  Cauca- 
sian, Mongolian,  Ethiopian,  American,  and  Malay  :  The  Leading 
Characters  of  Each,  . .' 359 

EVENING   TWENTY-NINTH. 

Descent  of  all  Mankind  from  Noah ;  or  the  Unity  of  the  Human 
Races,  372 

EVENING    THIRTIETH. 

Demand  upon  Advocates  of  Plurality  —  Archaeological  Objection 
against  the  doctrine  of  the  Universal  Descent  of  Mankind  from 
Noah  considered, 38o 

EVENING    THIRTY-FIRST. 

Consideration  of  the  Archaeological  Objection,  continued— Scripture 
Chronology — The  Common  Chronology  may  be  retained  —  A 
frequent  Error  in  Tables  —  Antediluvian  Longevity  —  Post- 
diluvian Reduction  of  term  of  Life  —  How  to  be  accounted  for  — 
The  Life  of  the  Patriarch  how  eventful ;  and  what  the  Magnitude 
of  the  Events  —  The  Patriarch's  Influence,  how  benign  and 
lasting  —  His  Memorial  with  us, 398 


NOAH    AND    HIS    TIMES. 


INTRODUCTION. 

IT  was  about  sunset  on  a  day  in  the  middle  of  November, 
of  the  year  185-,  that  three  young  men  were  seen  crossing 
the  beautiful  green  plat  termed  "  the  square,"  in  the  delight- 
ful borough  of ,  and  entering  the  mansion  of  a  Mr. 

.      This    gentleman,    who    was   for    several    years 

employed  in  an  important  professional  vocation  in , 

had,  on  account  of  somewhat  impaired  health,  retired  from 
that  station,  and,  with  his  small  family,  had  recently  come  to 
reside  in  this  charming  locality.  It  was  a  borough  noted  not 
only  for  its  beauty,  but  for  the  elevated  and  excellent 
character  of  its  population. 

Belonging  to  the  families  of  its  residents  were  some  fifty 
young  men,  who  had  formed  the  resolution  to  avail  themselves 
of  every  facility  within  reach  for  augmenting  their  intellect- 
ual stores,  and  preparing  to  be  otherwise  than  useless  drones 
in  whatever  community,  severally,  they  should  be  afterward 
assigned  their  permanent  abode ;  and  having  learned  that 

among  his  various  other  acquirements,  Mr. had  turned 

his  attention  somewhat  specially,  and  from  choice,  to  those  de- 
partments of  knowledge  which  sustain  an  interesting  connection 
with  Sacred  History,  they  had  held  a  meeting,  and  after 
2 


14  INTRODUCTION. 

deliberation  had  appointed  the  three  young  gentlemen  alluded 
to,  to  wait  on  him  with  an  invitation  and  request  that  he  would 
favor  them  with  a  series  of  Evening  Lectures  upon  Noah  and 

his   Times.     This  invitation  Mr. promised   to   take 

into  consideration,  and,  if  they  would  call  the  succeeding 
evening,  to  give  them,  then,  an  answer. 

Upon  their  calling,  at  the  time  appointed,  they  received  in 
substance  the  following  reply :  So  far  as  falls  within  the  com- 
pass of  my  power  it  will  afford  me  pleasure,  young  gentlemen, 
to  comply  with  the  invitation  and  request  which  you  were 
the  commissioned  organ  in  conveying  to  me  last  evening. 

The  range  of  topic  which  has  been  suggested  is  extensive, 
and  will  require  brevity  of  treatment  of  any  one  part  of  it. 
At  no  previous  period  was  a  discussion  of  the  questions  which 
will  come  before  us  so  important,  for  never  before  since  man 
was  breathed  into  being  was  there  the  same  amount  of  effort 
put  forth  to  array  Science  against  Revelation  —  to  represent 
the  testimonies  of  the  former  as  conflicting,  and  utterly 
irreconcilable,  with  the  testimonies  of  the  latter.  Anti-bibli- 
cal prejudice,  in  connection  with  more  or  less  scientific  pos- 
session or  pretension,  has  specially  exerted  itself,  in  -our  day, 
to  prove  the  prime  sacred  historian  to  have  fallen  into  many 
serious  mistakes  —  to  have  penned  numerous  untruths.  It 
will  be  our  endeavor,  among  other  things,  to  show  that  it  is 
not  quite  so  clear  as  some  would  have  us  believe,  that  the 
historic  statements  of  Moses  are  unworthy  of  credence ;  — 
to  try  to  make  it  appear  that  as  Nature  does  not,  so  neither 
does  Scripture,  proclaim  a  falsehood  ;  —  that  their  utterances, 
so  far  as  both  have  any  thing  to  say  on  the  same  subjects,  are 
not  discrepant  —  eminently  harmonize.  This  will  indeed 
constitute  but  a  part  of  our  endeavor.  Attempts  will  also  be 
made  to  explain  the  import  of  a  large  number  of  hints  given 
by  the  archaic  writer  in  that  succinct  but  comprehensive  por- 


INTRODUCTION.  15 

tion  of  the  Word  of  God  —  the  first  eleven  chapters  of  Gen- 
esis, —  and  to  exhibit  some  variety  of  opinion  among  authors 
respecting  their  meaning. 

As  those  from  whom  you  come  profess  alone  a  desire  for 
instruction,  as  their  number  is  small,  and  my  vocal  power  at 
present  quite  limited,  my  efforts  before  them  must  not  be 
expected  to  partake  so  much  of  the  character  of  lectures 
from  a  platform,  as  that  of  conversational  or  familiar  exer- 
cises. These  also  will  be  brief. 

Please  say  to  the  body  of  whom  you  are  a  committee  that 
the  exercises  will  consist  of  two  per  week  (Tuesday  and  Fri- 
day evenings,)  until  the  series  shall  be  completed ;  and  that 
on  Tuesday  evening  next,  Providence  permitting,  will  be  had, 
in  the  hall  where  they  are  accustomed  to  assemble,  our  First 
Exercise. 


EVENING   FIRST. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN  : 

Whilst  I  appear  before  you  with  some  distrust  of  my 
ability  to  satisfy  your  reasonable  desires  and  expectations,  I 
cannot  at  the  same  time  say  that  it  is  with  reluctance.  Your 
age,  your  thirst  for  knowledge,  and  the  intrinsic  interest  and 
importance  of  the  subjects  upon  the  investigation  of  which 
you  desire  to  enter,  were  all  such  as  to  urge  me  to  accept  of 
the  respectful  invitation  which  through  your  committee  was 
presented  me.  In  addition,  I  am  thus  furnished  an  occasion 
to  enlarge  my  acquaintance  with  truths  and  facts  which  at 
no  previous  period  engaged  so  interested  and  general  atten- 
tion, or  about  which  doubt  or  incredulity  has  so  much 
hovered. 

NOAH  AND  HIS  TIMES  :  To  the  Sacred  Annals  we  must 
resort  —  where  else  can  we  ?  —  for  prime  and  reliable  infor- 
mation in  regard  to  these  ?  I  say,  where  else  can  we  ?  for 
no  history  save  that  of  which  Moses  is  the  writer,  reaches 
within  centuries  of  the  period  in  which  that  patriarch  was 
engaged  in  acting  his  part  on  this  sublunary  theatre.  Yet 
within  how  circumscribed  a  compass  is  embraced  all  that  the 
writings  of  that  sacred  archaic  historian  contain  respecting 
them.  A  few  short  chapters  —  what  can  be  penned  in  some 
half  a  dozen  hours  —  and  you  come  to  the  end  of  all  that 
the  first  inspired  annalist  has  to  say  about  them. 

Noah :  —  The  first  mention  which  the  pen  of  history  makes 


IMPORT  OP  THE  NAME  NOAH.  17 

of  him  is  in  the  closing  part  (verses  28  —  32,)  of  the  5th 
chapter  of  Genesis.  The  original  terms  expressive  of  his 
name,  TO  noach,  and  cm  nahham,  denoting  rest  and  comfort, 
have  so  much  resemblance  to  each  other  that  we  may  regard 
the  language  as  an  instance  of  that  paranomasia  which  is  of 
not  infrequent  occurrence  in  the  sacred  writings.  By  the 
prompting  of  the  spirit  of  prophecy  was  probably  the  be- 
stowal of  this  name  by  his  father  Lamech.  Precisely  in 
what  sense,  however,  there  was  to  be  in  the  person  of  this 
son  a  fulfilment  of  the  prediction,  is  perhaps  indeterminable. 
Bishop  Sherlock  was  of  the  opinion  that  the  curse  upon  the 
earth  inflicted  in  consequence  of  Adam's  sin  had,  in  connec- 
tion with  the  progressive  increase  of  corruption  and  crime, 
been  growing  more  and  more  severe  ever  since  the  Fall,  so 
that  the  exertion  and  toil  requisite  to  bring  from  the  ground 
a  sufficient  sustenance  for  life  had  become  almost  intolerable. 
And  those  words  of  Lamech  upon  conferring  the  name,  and 
as  a  reason  for  it,  "  This  same  shall  comfort  us  concerning 
our  work,  and  the  (sorrowful)  toil  of  our  hands,  because  of 
the  ground  which  the  Lord  hath  cursed,"  (Gen.  5  :  29,)  he 
supposes  to  refer  to  a  general  expectation  that  by  the  inter- 
vention or  instrumentality  of  some  distinguished  personage, 
the  rigor  of  the  curse  was  to  be  greatly  abated,  and  the  earth 
measurably  restored  to  its  primitive  fertility  and  ease  of  cul- 
tivation. This  personage  he  conceives  that  the  Sethite 
Lamech  (Sethite,  in  distinction  from  one  of  the  same  name, 
the  fifth  in  descent  from  Cain,)  under  divine  suggestion, 
recognized  in  his  new-born  child,  and  bestowed  upon  him  a 
name  in  accordance  with  the  fact.  The  prediction  thus  un- 
derstood he  maintains  has  been  verified  by  the  event ;  that 
the  earth,  from  the  time  of  the  flood,  was  in  a  good  degree 
restored  from  the  curse  laid  upon  it  at  the  Fall,  and  is  still 
enjoying  the  effect  of  the  blessing  bestowed  upon  Noah. 
Says  Bishop  Patrick  on  this  point :  There  was  a  general 
2* 


18  WHY  THE   NAME    GIVEN. 

curse  upon  the  earth  for  the  sin  of  Adam,  and  a  particular 
one  for  the  sin  of  Cain.  Now  God,  Lamech  foretells,  would 
in  great  measure  take  them  both  off,  and  bless  the  earth  to 
the  posterity  of  this  same  man  (Noah,)  who  perfected  the 
art  of  husbandry,  and  found  out  fitter  instruments  for  culti- 
vating the  soil  than  had  been  previously  known.  The  He- 
brew interpreters  generally  expound  the  declaration,  "  He 
shall  comfort  us  concerning  our  work  and  the  toil  of  our 
hands,"  thus  :  He  shall  make  our  labor  in  tilling  the  earth 
more  easy  —  less  toilsome  to  us. 

Dr.  Shuckford  (in  his  Connexions,  vol.  1,  p.  93,)  advances 
the  idea,  that  Lamech  was  probably  informed  from  God,  that 
his  son  Noah  should  obtain  a  grant  of  the  creatures  for  the 
use  of  man ;  and  knowing  the  labor  and  inconveniences  they 
were  then  under,  he  rejoiced  in  foreseeing  what  ease  and 
comfort  they  would  have  when  they  should  obtain  a  large 
supply  of  food  from  the  creatures,  superadded  to  what  could 
be  produced  from  the  ground  by  tillage. 

Ainsworth,  in  his  Annotations,  says  that  this  prophecy  his 
father  uttered  of  him,  as  he  that  should  be  a  figure  of  Christ 
in  his  building  of  the  ark,  and  offering  of  sacrifice,  whereby 
God  smelled  a  savor  of  rest,  and  said  he  would  not  curse 
the  ground  any  more  for  man's  sake.  And  Dr.  J.  Pye  Smith, 
in  his  article  Noah,  in  Kitto's  Cyclopedia,  remarks  that  the 
declaration,  "  This  same  shall  comfort  us,"  &c.,  contains  an 
undoubted  allusion  to  the  penal  consequences  of  the  fall  in 
earthly  toils  and  sufferings,  and  to  the  hope  of  a  Deliverer 
excited  by  the  promise  made  to  our  First  Mother.  That 
this  expectation  was  grounded  upon  a  Divine  communication 
he  thinks  is  to  be  inferred  from  the  importance  attached  to 
it,  and  the  confidence  of  its  expression. 

We  have  thought  it  proper  to  cite  this  variety  of  opinions 
in  detail,  because  of  its  relation  to  the  very  name  of  the 
patriarch  whose  Life  and  Times  are  to  be  so  much  with  us 


NOAH'S  CONTEMPORARIES.  19 

the  theme  of  meditation.  Suffer  me,  in  conclusion  on  this 
point,  to  remark,  that  while  the  father  of  Noah,  in  the  con- 
ferring of  this  appellation,  may  perhaps  have  had  respect  to  the 
precious  Messianic  promise  relating  to  the  seed  of  the  woman, 
and  might  even  have  hoped,  possibly,  that  he  had  obtained 
that  promised  seed ;  yet  it  may  be  imagined  more  probable 
that  Lamech  spoke  by  the  spirit  of  prophecy,  which  revealed 
to  him,  thus  early,  that  our  patriarch  would  be  an  extraor- 
dinary person ;  and  not  only  a  great  comfort  to  his  parents 
and  relatives  amidst  their  toils  and  sorrows,  but  likewise  a 
great  blessing  to  mankind ;  —  with  especial  reference  to  the 
preservation  of  the  human  species  with  him  in  the  ark,  which 
typified  the  salvation  of  sinners  by  Jesus  Christ. 

Noah  lived,  in  all,  950  years.  Six  hundred  of  these  he 
passed  in  the  Old  World,  so  to  speak,  and  three  hundred  and 
fifty  in  the  New.  He  was  born,  according  to  the  Hebrew  or 
Usherian  chronology,  Anno  Mundi,  1056,  and  died  A.  M. 
2006  —  that  is,  according  to  the  chronology  just  referred  to, 
two  years  before  the  birth  of  Abraham.  You  see,  then,  young 
gentlemen,  the  extent  of  the  field  over  which  you  have 
requested  me  to  lead  you.  With  nearly  all  of  the  Antedilu- 
vian Patriarchs  Noah  was  contemporary  —  I  mean,  he  was 
on  the  earth  a  portion  of  the  same  time  that  they  were.  He 
was  not  acquainted  with  Adam,  nor  even  with  his  son  Seth, 
being  born  126  years  after  the  death  of  the  former,  and  14 
years  subsequent  to  the  decease  of  the  latter.  With  all  those 
of  Adam's  sons  and  daughters,  however,  who  were  born 
twenty  or  more  years  posterior  to  Seth's  birth,  and  lived  to 
as  great  age  as  did  Seth,  he  might  have  been  acquainted ;  — 
and  if  he  lived  in  the  same  part  of  the  world  and  had  in- 
tercourse with  them,  he  could  from  their  lips  have  learned 
what  they  heard  their  father  Adam  relate  about  the  creation 
—  about  paradise,  its  locality,  its  scenery,  beauties,  and  the 
situation,  enjoyments,  and  avocations  of  the  primal  pair  whilst 


20  THE   ANTEDILUVIAN    EVENTS    HE    WITNESSED. 

there  was  a  retention  of  their  innocence ;  of  the  temptation  in  its 
various  particulars ;  of  the  guise  and  manner  in  general  in 
which  the  Tempter  appeared ;  what  he  uttered ;  the  sort  of 
wiles  and  arts  he  practised ;  —  of  the  Fall,  and  the  way  in 
which  Jehovah  appeared  to  and  accosted  our  first  parents ; 
their  emotional  experience,  efforts  for  concealment,  arraign- 
ment, trial,  and  ejectment  from  the  garden ;  —  how  and  where 
they  were  afterwards  situated ;  the  dealings  of  the  Lord  with 
them  during  their  subsequent  lifetime ;  the  special  events  they 
witnessed  and  scenes  passed  through ;  together  with  those 
interesting  particulars  relating  to  the  kind  and  measure 
of  intercourse  Jehovah  had  with  them,  and  disclosures  he 
made  to  them. 

Or,  as  Adam  lived  until  Noah's  grandfather,  Methuselah, 
was  243  years  old,  and  Lamech,  his  father,  56 ;  and  as  the 
former  lived  till  the  very  year  of  the  Deluge,  and  the  latter 
departed  this  life  only  five  years  prior  to  that  event,  Noah 
could  have  enjoyed  the  privilege  of  hearing  each  of  these 
recount  what  they  may  have  heard  from  Adam's  and  Eve's 
lips  concerning  the  objects  and  events  a  moment  since  men- 
tioned. 

As  to  those  antediluvian  patriarchs  whose  names  are  re- 
corded, it  is  worthy  of  note  —  and  you  may  see  it  by  looking 
over  the  Table  I  will,  before  closing  this  Exercise,  give  you 
—  that  Noah  lived  back  in  Enos's  (Adam's  grandson's)  time, 
eighty-six  years :  in  Enos's  son  Cainan's  lifetime,  179 
years ;  lived  as  a  contemporary  with  Mahalaleel,  234  years ; 
with  Jared,  366  ;  with  Methuselah,  his  grandfather,  600 
years  ;  and  with  his  father,  595  —  for  Noah's  father,  as  you 
will  discover  by  the  table,  died  five  years  before  his  grand- 
father. Accordingly,  Noah  was  witness  to  a  not  inconsider- 
able portion  of  the  events  which  transpired  anterior  to  the 
Flood,  as  well  as  those  occurring  during  the  period  of  350 
years  subsequently.  Accept,  young  gentlemen,  of  a  copy, 
each,  of  the  Table  to  which  I  have  alluded.  Compare  it  at 


ANTEDILUVIAN   PUBERTY. 


21 


your  leisure  with  the  Genealogical  Record  which  the  sacred 
historian  has  furnished  in  the  5th  of  Genesis. 


**   0 

|| 

JB| 

09 

i 

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o 

8  . 

ACCORDING  TO    THE    HEBREW  TEXT. 

.a  * 

IN 

I'll 

9 

ji 

•M 

co       <-* 

^              K*> 

.6 

rt  « 

rt  ® 

^ 

p>    O 

n^ 

Q 

fi*s 

r^  +J 

LJ  S 

0) 

"5 

M  £> 

W.3 

M  c3 
1 

3 

P 

1 

130 

800 

930 

930 

Seth,  

130 

105 

807 

912 

1042 

235 

90 

815 

905 

1140 

325 

70 

840 

910 

1235 

Mahalaleel,  

395 

65 

830 

895 

1290 

460 

162 

800 

962 

1422 

622 

65 

300 

365 

987 

687 

187 

782 

969 

1656 

874 

182 

595 

777 

1651 

Noah,  

1056 

500 

950 

2006 

Our  patriarch  (Noah)  was  in  the  600th  year  of  his  age 
when  the  overflowing  Flood  came  (Gen.  7:  11) — which 
diluvial  event  occurred  in  the  year  of  the  world  1656.  It  is 
noteworthy  that  all  the  antediluvian  patriarchs,  except  Noah, 
visited  the  earth  ere  the  first  father  of  our  race  left  it.  La- 
mech;  Noah's  father,  as  has  been  already  hinted,  was  a  half- 
dozen  years  beyond  half  a  century  old  at  the  time  that  Adam 
encountered  the  dying  strife.  These  all,  Noah  solely 
excepted,  might  receive  from  their  first  father's  own  mouth  a 
full  and  minute  account  of  the  scenes  he  witnessed,  and  the 
events  transpiring  in  time's  dawn. 

Whether,  in  the  genealogical  record  contained  in  the  5th  of 
Genesis,  the  son  whose  name  is  given  was  the  first  or  eldest 
child  of  each  patriarch,  or  whether  these  all,  or  a  part  of 
them,  had  children  born  to  them  antecedently,  cannot,  except 
in  Seth's  case,  be  determined,  any  more  than  it  can  be  cer- 
tainly determined  whether  those  antediluvians  arrived  at 
maturity  as  early  as  mankind  do  now,  —  or  whether  they 
ripened  then  more  slowly,  and  in  proportion  as  they  lived 


22        A  PROMINENT  EVENT  OF  ENOS's  DAT. 

longer.  Upon  that  statement,  (Gen.  5 :  6,)  "  Seth  lived  an 
hundred  and  five  years  and  begat  Enos,"  Bishop  Patrick  re- 
marks, that  we  must  not  think  Seth  lived  so  long  before  he 
begat  any  children  —  any  more  than  that  Adam  had  none  till  he 
was  130  years  old,  when  he  begat  Seth.  We  must  consider, 
says  he,  that  Moses  sets  down  only  those  persons  by  whom 
the  line  of  Noah  was  drawn  from  Seth,  and  Abraham's  line 
from  Noah,  by  their  true  ancestors,  whether  they  are  the 
eldest  of  the  family  or  not.  Seth,  he  continues,  it  is  likely 
had  many  other  children  ere  Enos  was  born,  as  Methuselah, 
we  may  be  confident,  had  before  the  birth  of  Lamech ;  and 
Lamech  had  prior  to  the  birth  of  Noah,  —  though  Moses  does 
not  mention  those  elder  children  of  Lamech,  because  he  was 
here  concerned  only  to  inform  us  who  was  the  father  of  Noah. 

If  the  antediluvians  did  arrive  at  puberty  as  early  as 
human  beings  do  now,  it  surely  is  not  improbable  that  every 
one  of  them  had  children  born  to  them,  and  in  not  a  few 
cases  quite  a  number,  anterior  to  the  one  in  each  case  whose 
name  is  given  —  for  the  youngest  period  in  which  any  of  them, 
after  Adam,  is  spoken  of  as  having  a  son  born,  is  at  the  age 
of  65  years,  and  only  two  at  so  early  a  period  of  life  even  as 
that;  whilst  the  majority  were  over  a  hundred;  one  162, 
another  182,  and  gtill  another  187,  before  the  birth  of  the 
recorded  son. 

As  Adam's  grandson,  Enos,  lived  until  Noah  was  fourscore 
and  four  years  old,  the  latter  may  have  become  directly,  per- 
sonally, acquainted  with  the  event  —  have  obtained  a  more 
certain  knowledge  in  regard  to  it,  than,  as  will  soon  appear, 
his  descendants,  at  least  modern,  have  acquired  —  related  in 
Gen.  4 :  26  —  to  wit :  "  Then  began  men  to  call  upon  the  name 
of  the  Lord."  We  do  not  lay  claim  to  so  large  a  share  of  pre- 
sumption as  to  venture  to  speak  positively  concerning  the 
import  of  these  words,  as  used  in  the  original.  The  language 
has  been  the  source  of  much  perplexity  and  trouble  to  biblical 
critics  and  expounders.  This  has  arisen  in  part  from  the  paren- 


WHAT   ITS     CHARACTER.  23 

thetic  character  of  the  sentence,  and  its  extreme  brevity ;  but 
more  still  from  the  varieties  of  signification  of  the  verb 
ibn  halal,  which  may  be  understood  as  denoting  both  to 
begin,  and  to  profane.  If  the  former  rendering  be  adopted, 
then  the  declaration  contained  in  the  passage  will  be,  "A 
beginning  was  made  for  calling  by  or  upon  the  name  of  Jeho- 
vah. If  the  latter  be  chosen,  then  the  passage  may  be  read  : 
"  Profanation  was  committed  for  calling  the  name  of  Jehovah," 
i.  e.,  applying  the  divine  name  to  other  objects. 

Among  those  biblical  expositors  who  have  selected  the  first 
of  the  two  meanings  specified  —  and  we  believe  they  constitute 
the  major  number  —  there  is  still  some  variety  of  interpreta- 
tion of  the  clause,  yet  of  an  affiliated  or  kindred  character  — 
understanding  the  words  to  indicate  an  event  favorable  to 
piety.  That  variety  may  be  summarily  presented :  Then 
began  the  worshippers  of  Jehovah  to  be  distinguished  by  the 
appellation,  sons  of  God.  (This  interpretation  was  adopted 
by  Aquila,  Piscator,  Diodati,  Hackspan,  Leclerc,  Bishop 
Patrick,  Wells,  Deserer,  &c.  Deserer's  note  merits  citation  : 
"  Some  pious  families  began  to  call  themselves  sons,  —  in  the 
Hebrew  idiom  equivalent  to  disciples,  learners,  —  of  God,  in 
order  to  distinguish  themselves  from  the  sons  of  men,  those 
who  disregarded  the  instructions  of  divine  authority,  and  gave 
themselves  up  to  wickedness.)"  Then  commenced  —  not  a 
first  offering  of  prayer  to  the  Lord,  since  our  first  parents, 
Abel,  Seth,  and  many  others,  were  previously,  no  doubt,  true 
supplicants  and  worshippers  —  but  an  increase  of  the  spirit  of 
true  religion.  Then  the  godly  " began  to  stir  up  themselves" 
as  Matthew  Henry  has  it,  "  to  do  more  in  religion  than  they 
had  done  —  perhaps  not  more  than  had  been  done  at  first,  but 
more  than  had  been  done  of  late,  since  the  defection  of  Cain. 
Or  now  there  was  so  great  a  reformation  in  religion  that  it 
was,  as  it  were,  a  new  beginning  of  it."  Then  began  among 
men  an  extension  of  religious  privileges.  Then  commenced 
they  the  erection  of  temples,  being  desirous  to  offer  worship  to 


24  WHAT   ITS     CHARACTER. 

the  Lord  of  Hosts  in  public  and  solemn  assemblies,  and  not 
solely,  as  formerly,  in  their  closets  and  families.  Then  be- 
gan the  pious  to  make  a  more  open  and  formal  profession  of 
religion  —  giving  to  the  church  of  God  a  more  thoroughly 
organized  form,  and  marked  visibility —  in  this  way  rendering 
more  distinguishable  and  wide  the  distance  between  the  friends 
and  the  enemies  of  God ;  and  increasing  the  obstacles  to  all 
improper  and  injurious  association  betwixt  the  former  and  the 
latter.  We  will  only  further  remark,  on  this  side,  that  the 
Syriac  version,  and  the  Latin  of  Jerome,  both  make  JZnos, 
exclusively,  the  agent  of  the  verb  :  "  Then  he  (Enos)  began  to 
call  upon  the  name  of  the  Lord." 

On  the  other  hand,  as  the  word  bbn  halal,  denotes  also  to 
profane — an  obvious  instance  of  which  you  may  witness  by 
turning  to  Lev.  19  :  12, —  there  have  been  not  a  few  who 
have  understood  the  declaration  in  the  passage  referred  to,  to 
be  made  of  the  ivicked — considering  the  meaning  of  the 
historian  to  be,  that  the  most  holy  name  which  belongs  to  the 
Creator  and  Possessor  of  heaven  and  earth  alone  —  the  name 
Jehovah  —  was  now  profaned  by  wicked  men;  being  im- 
piously given  unto  creatures,  particularly  the  sun,  and  other 
heavenly  bodies.  This  is  the  more  common  view  among  the 
learned  Jewish  writers  —  and  the  learned  Selden  and  several 
others  join  them  in  it.  The  Jewish  writer,  Maimonides,  in 
his  Treatise  on  Idolatry,  holds  forth  this  view,  and  has  dis- 
cussed it  at  some  length.  You  will  not  tire  if  I  give  it  you : 
—  "  In  the  days  of  Enos,  the  sons  of  Adam  erred  with  great 
error ;  and  their  error  was  this :  They  said,  forasmuch  as 
God  '  ath  created  these  stars  and  spheres  to  govern  the 
world,  and  set  them  on  high,  and  imparted  honor  unto  them, 
and  they  are  ministers  that  minister  before  him  ;  it  is  meet 
that  man  should  laud  and  glorify,  and  give  them  honor. 
For  this  is  the  will  of  God,  that  we  magnify  and  honor 
whomsoever  He  magnifieth  and  honoreth:  even  as  a  king 
would  have  them  that  stand  before  him ;  and  this  is  the  honor 


WHAT   ITS   CHARACTER.  25 

of  the  king  himself.  When  this  thing  was  come  up  into  their 
hearts,  they  began  to  build  temples  unto  the  stars,  and  to 
offer  sacrifice  unto  them,  and  to  laud  and  glorify  them  with 
words,  and  to  worship  before  them,  that  they  might  in  their 
evil  opinion  obtain  favor  of  the  Creator.  And  this  was  the 
sort  of  idolatry,  &c.  And,  in  process  of  time,  there  stood  up 
false  prophets  among  the  sons  of  Adam,  who  said  that  God 
had  commanded  and  said  unto  them,  Worship  such  a  star,  or 
all  the  stars,  and  do  sacrifice  unto  them  thus  and  thus  :  and 
build  a  temple  for  it,  and  make  an  image  of  it,  that  all  the 
people,  women  and  children,  may  worship  it ;  and  the  false 
prophet  showed  them  the  image  which  he  had  feigned  out  of 
his  own  heart,  and  said  it  was  the  image  of  such  a  star, 
which  was  made  known  to  him  by  prophecy.  And  they 
began  after  this  manner  to  make  images  in  temples,  and 
under  trees,  and  on  tops  of  mountains  and  hills,  and  as- 
sembled together  and  worshipped  them.  And  this  thing  was 
spread  through  all  the  world,  to  serve  images  with  services 
different  one  from  another,  and  to  sacrifice  unto  and  worship 
them.  So  in  process  of  time,  the  Glorious  and  Fearful 
name  (of  Jehovah)  was  forgotten  out  of  the  mouth  of  all  the 
living,  and  out  of  their  knowledge,  and  they  acknowledged 
him  not.  And  there  was  found  no  people  on  the  earth  that 
knew  aught  save  images  of  wood  and  stone,  which  they  had 
been  trained  up  from  their  childhood  to  worship  and  serve, 
and  to  swear  by  their  names.  And  the  wise  men  that  were 
among  them,  as  the  priests  and  such  like,  thought  there  was 
no  god  save  the  stars  and  spheres,  for  whose  sake  and  in 
whose  likeness  they  had  made  these  images.  But  as  £;  r  the 
Rock  Everlasting,  there  was  no  man  that  acknowledged  Him 
or  knew  Him,  save  a  few  persons  in  the  world,  as  Enoch, 
Methuselah,  Noah,  Shem,  and  Heber.  And  in  this  way  did 
the  world  walk  and  converse,  till  that  pillar  of  the  world, 
Abraham,  our  Father,  was  born." 

That  the  world  was,  even  thus  early,  in  such  a  melancholy 


26  THE   NAMES   EXPRESSIVE. 

state  with  regard  to  morals  and  religion  as  to  favor  this  view, 
has  by  some  been  understood  to  be  indicated  by  the  name 
jEnos,  which  signifies  sorrowful —  his  father,  a  good  man,  and 
grieved  at  the  degeneracy,  present  and  prospective,  of  a  large 
portion  of  mankind,  being  prompted  to  confer  the  name  on 
this  account.  It  was  customary  in  those  times,  as  it  has 
indeed  been  in  later,  to  bestow  names  on  children  according 
to  the  occurrences  in  life,  or  the  expectations  of  parents. 
Hence  also  Enos,  perceiving  the  posterity  of  Cain  to  deteri- 
orate, morally,  as  time  progressed,  was  affected  by  this  fact, 
and  feared  the  consequences  of  it  as  to  themselves,  and  that 
the  moral  contamination  might  spread  and  seriously  affect 
others,  and  therefore  appropriated  to  his  son  the  name 
Cainan — a  word  signifying  Lamentation,  or  as  some  define 
it,  Possessor,  as  if  apprehending  that  this  his  child  might 
become  possessor  of  a  like  moral  malady  with  that  which  he 
witnessed  Cain's  descendants  disseminating.  Though  Cainan 
had  his  name  from  the  wickedness  of  Gain's  family,  yet  he 
himself  was  resolved  to  maintain  the  true  worship  of  God  in 
his  own,  and  therefore  called  his  son  Mahalaleel,  i.  e.,  a 
Praiser  or*  Worshipper  of  God.  In  the  days  of  Mahalaleel, 
as  tradition  tells  us,  a  defection  occurred  among  the  progeny 
of  Seth,  who  went  down  from  the  elevated  or  hill  country 
where  they  dwelt,  and  allied  themselves  to  the  daughters  of 
the  Cainite  stock;  and  therefore  Mahalaleel  denominated 
his  son  Jared,  which  signifies  descending.  Jared,  to  guard 
against  the  very  general  corruption,  devoted  himself  and  his 
descendants  more  zealously  to  the  service  of  the  Lord 
Almighty,  and  accordingly  designated  his  son  by  the  name 
Enoch,  which  means  a  dedication.  Enoch,  by  the  spirit  of 
prophecy,  foreseeing  the  destruction  which  would  come  upon 
the  world,  immediately  after  the  death  of  his  son,  called  him 
Methuselah  —  the  first  part  of  which  (methu)  signifies  he  dies  ; 
and  the  other  part  (selah)  denotes  the  sending  forth  (as  of 
water),  —  indicating  what  actually  at  length  occurred,  for 


THE   NAMES   EXPRESSIVE.  27 

Methuselah  died  in  the  year  of  the  deluge.  Methuselah, 
perceiving  the  wickedness  in  the  posterity  of  Seth,  as  well  as 
that  of  Cain,  to  grow  every  day  worse  and  worse,  called  his 
son  Lantech,  which  intimates  a  poor  man,  humbled,  and 
afflicted  with  grief,  for  the  present  corruption,  and  fear  of 
future  punishment.  And  Lamech,  conceiving  better  hopes  of 
his  son,  gave  him  the  name  Noah,  the  import  of  which  we 
have  already  stated. 

These  all  had  "  sons  and  daughters,"  —  probably  a  large 
number  of  each,  —  but  the  historian,  under  the  guidance  of 
the  Spirit,  has  not  furnished  us  with  a  catalogue  of  the  nu- 
merous collateral  branches,  but  only  of  the  principal  persons 
by  whom,  in  a  right  line,  the  succession  was  continued  down 
to  Noah,  and  thence  to  Abraham,  the  Founder  of  the  Jewish 
nation. 


<?$5*fe 


EVENING    SECOND. 


YOTJNG  GENTLEMEN  : 

One  of  our  patriarch's  more  immediate  ancestors  there  was, 
whom,  on  account  of  his  comparatively  brief  stay  on  the  shores 
of  time,  Noah  never  saw.  We  allude  to  his  great  grandfather, 
Enoch,  —  whose  removal  from  the  world  took  place  Anno 
Mundi  987,  i.  e.,  69  years  anterior  to  Noah's  introduction 
upon  this  earthly  platform.  Yet  his  ears  had  heard  his  father, 
grandfather,  and  others,  speak  so  much  about  him,  that  it 
seemed  to  him  almost  as  if  he  had  had  a  personal  and  some- 
what intimate  acquaintance  with  him.  This  Enoch  —  a  very 
different  character,  by  the  way,  from  a  son  of  Cain  by  the 
same  name  —  was  in  some  respects  one  of  the  most  remarka- 
ble personages  of  antediluvian  times.  We  learn  from  the 
epistle  of  Jude  (14th  and  15th  verses)  that  he  was  a  prophet 
of  God,  foretelling  not  alone  clearly,  but  in  glowing  terms,  a 
judgment  to  come ;  and  likewise  a  preacher  of  righteousness, 
and  a  bold,  unflinching  reprover  of  the  ungodly  of  his  day  — 
who,  en  passant,  had  not  only  become,  at  this  so  high  period 
of  antiquity,  numerous,  but  excessively  daring  in  their  impiety. 
How  the  apostle  Jude  was  put  in  possession  of  what  he  states 
in  the  verses  to  which  we  have  alluded,  there  have  been  vari- 
ous conjectures  concerning.  The  Jews  ascribed  to  him, 
among  other  things,  visions  and  prophecies  in  abundance,  and 
had  a  curious  tradition  that  these  were  arranged  by  Enoch  in 
a  book  ;  that  this  book  was  delivered  to  his  son  Methuselah, 


ENOCH'S  TRANSLATION.  29 

who,  before  his  death,  put  it  into  the  hands  of  Noah,  who  pre- 
served it  in  the  ark  ;  and  after  the  Flood  that  this  book  was 
made  known  to  the  world,  and  handed  down  from  generation 
to  generation.  That  this  is  improbable,  we  need  hardly  take 
the  pains  to  declare.  There  was,  however,  an  Apocryphal 
Book  of  Enoch,  which  its  translator,  Archbishop  Laurence, 
thinks  was  written  in  the  reign  of  Herod.  That  it  was  com- 
posed at  least  thus  early,  appears  supported  by  the  fact  of  its 
being  alluded  to  by  Justin  Martyr,  Irenaeus,  Clemens  Alex- 
andrinus,  Origen,  &c. ;  and  from  its  being  likewise  quoted  on 
various  occasions  in  the  Testament  of  the  Twelve  Patriarchs, 
which  Nitzsch  has  shown  to  belong  to  the  latter  part  of  the 
first  or  the  beginning  of  the  second  century.  It  has  been  the 
opinion  of  some,  that  Jude  cited  in  substance  what  he  men- 
tions from  it ;  and  really  there  is  a  remarkable  similarity,  as 
you  will  perceive  by  comparing  those  verses  in  Jude  to  which 
we  have  referred,  with  the  following  language  from  the  Book 
of  Enoch  : — "Behold  he  comes  with  ten  thousands  of  his 
saints,  to  execute  judgment  upon  them,  and  destroy  the 
wicked,  and  reprove  all  the  carnal  for  everything  which  the 
sinful  and  ungodly  have  done,  and  committed  against  him." 
These  words  constitute  the  second  chapter  of  the  volume. 
The  conjecture  has  been  entertained  by  others,  that  Jude  either 
quoted  a  traditional  prophecy,  or  had  the  words  —  apparently 
cited  by  him  —  immediately  suggested  by  the  Holy  Spirit. 

That  Enoch  was  a  man  of  extraordinary  sanctity  —  that 
he  was  such  for  one  of  his  day  not  only,  but  for  any  period 
of  the  world  —  none,  after  what  the  Spirit  of  Inspiration  has 
averred  about  him,  will  be  inclined  to  question.  It  is  asserted 
of  him,  that  "  he  walked  with  God"  a  form  of  expression  im- 
plying the  closest  fellowship  with  Jehovah  which  it  is  possi- 
ble to  enjoy  this  side  of  the  city  of  glory.  Such  a  similitude 
to  the  spirits  of  the  upper  sphere  did  he,  and  that,  too,  early 
in  antediluvian  life,  bear,  that  Infinite  Love  would  not  suffer 
him  any  longer  to  tarry  at  such  a  distance  from  the  measure- 
3* 


30  ITS   INFLUENCE. 

less  Fountain  of  bliss.  "Wishing  to  have  him  where  sin  and 
sorrow  are  unknown  —  nearer,  much  nearer  his  blazing 
throne  —  within  the  encircling  effulgence  of  his  glory  —  the 
Supreme  Arbiter,  without  waiting  for  him  to  throw  off  his 
mantle,  caught  him  up,  and  far  beyond  the  gaze  of  mortals 
suddenly  bearing  him,  set  him  down  on  sunnier  heights  than 
mortal  vision  witnesses.  What  an  exemption  from  humani- 
ty's common  lot !  With  the  "  King  of  Terrors,"  this  man 
never  had  to  maintain  a  conflict.  He  obtained  the  laurel 
without  drawing  the  blade.  In  the  expressive  brevity  of  In- 
spiration, "  Enoch  was  translated  that  he  should  not  see 
death ;  "  "  he  was  not,  for  God  took  him." 

Noah,  as  well  as  others,  heard  a  great  deal  about  that  won- 
derful occurrence  —  the  translation  of  this  his  ancestor ;  —  it 
was  still  a  fresh  theme  as  well  as  frequent,  of  conversation, 
when  he  was  a  boy  ;  —  it  had  been  but  as  yesterday  since 
it  had  occurred,  according  to  the  appearance  and  reckoning 
of  antediluvian  times.  It  was  a  memorable  event  truly  — 
sufficient  to  kindle  amazement  at  any  period  of  the  world. 
Very  early  in  life  it  became  a  very  prominent  theme  of 
meditation  with  our  patriarch.  He  pondered  it  with  intense 
interest.  The  evidence  it  afforded  of  a,  future  life  —  of  an 
existence  other  than  earthly,  —  would,  it  is  to  be  presumed,  be 
not  one  of  the  least  likely  to  arrest  and  hold  his  attention. 
Adam  had  died;  Eve,  Abel,  Seth  had  died  —  these  ere  he 
had  stepped  on  this  planet.  Since  he  had  become  a  sojourn- 
er  upon  it,  his  own  eyes  had  witnessed  the  mortal  throes  of 
at  least  some  of  his  species.  He  had  witnessed  the  apparent 
cessation  of  their  being ;  had  observed  the  change  which 
had  come  over  their  once  active  forms.  Their  once  spark- 
ling and  rolling  eye  he  had  seen  grow  dim  and  moveless  ; 
their  hands,  those  executive  members,  drop  by  their  side, 
saying  in  substance  as  they  fell,  we  have  finished  our  work. 
He  had  marked  the  vital  current  to  stop  and  freeze  in  their 
systems.  He  knew  where  all  that  had  been  visible  of  them 


DOCTRINE   OF   A  FUTURE   STATE.  31 

had  been  deposited.  None  of  them  did  he  witness  returning 
to  life ;  none  of  them  had  he  seen  moving  again  among  the 
living.  Is  there  then  no  future  life  ?  he  soliloquizes  with 
anxiety.  Where  is  my  great  grandfather,  Enoch  ?  Did  any 
one  see  his  eye  grow  dim  ?  his  hands  fall  ?  his  feet  refuse  to 
do  their  office  ?  Who  has  seen  him  die  ?  What  has  become 
of  this  man,  my  ancestor  ?  Who  can  say  that  he  has  borne 
him  away  and  buried  or  otherwise  disposed  of  him  ?  He  has 
not  ceased  to  be  r  he  exists  somewhere,  though  not  apparently 
where  mortal  vision  can  behold  him.  But  if  he,  though  re- 
moved, exists,  is  his  case  altogether  peculiar  ?  Does,  will, 
no  other  one  have  an  existence  after  removal?  Thus 
Noah's  mind  operated,  reasoned ;  and  thus  also  other  antedi- 
luvian minds  doubtless  moved  and  reasoned.  Enoch,  indeed, 
might  have  been  borne  aloft,  Elijah-like,  as  in  their  sight. 
His  neighbors  may  have  seen  the  chariot  bearing  him  into 
the  blue  heavens ;  might  have  inquired,  Whither  is  he  going  ? 
and  received  such  an  answer  as  to  silence  all  doubt  in  regard 
to  a  state  of  existence  beyond  this  life.  The  antediluvians 
needed  a  lesson  on  this  subject ;  they  needed  to  be  taught 
that  there  is  another  state  of  being ;  and  their  great  Creator 
in  mercy  presented  as  to  their  eyesight  the  immensely  inter- 
esting and  important  truth.  And  when  our  patriarch  became 
a  preacher,  as  we  shall  see  hereafter  that  he  did,  he  doubt- 
less insisted  much  on  this  doctrine,  as  now  we  call  it,  as  a 
not  trifling  or  unimportant  reason  why  they  should  not,  in  the 
language  of  the  epicure,  "  Live  "  while  "  they  live  "  —  an  ar- 
gument, and  it  ought  to  have  been  a  potent  and  influential 
one,  why  they  should  not  live  a  life  of  impiety  —  why  they 
should  not  provoke  but  please  the  Supreme  Disposer  of  their 
immortal  destiny. 

Some  have  doubted  whether  the  doctrine  of  a  future  state 
is  any  where  held  forth  in  the  Old  Testament.  Dr.  Warbur- 
ton,  who  seemed  to  take  pleasure  in  advancing  or  advocating 
some  new  and  startling  opinion,  and  in  attacking  ordinarily 


32  WHEN  NOAH  BECAME  PIOUS. 

received  truths  and  established  principles,  has,  in  his  Divine 
Legation  of  Moses,  (vol.  2,  pp.  553-568,)  set  forth  the  idea 
that  the  Mosaic  covenant  contained  no  promises  directly  re- 
lating to  a  future  state  —  because,  as  he  argues,  Moses  was 
secure  of  an  equal  providence,  and  therefore  needed  not  sub- 
sidiary sanctions  taken  from  a  future  state,  without  the  belief 
of  which  the  doctrine  of  a  universal  Providence  cannot 
ordinarily  be  vindicated,  nor  the  general  sanctions  of  religion 
secured.  We  wish  you  to  examine  Dr.  Warburton's  reason- 
ing when  convenient.  To  me  it  appears  strange  that  any 
should  hesitate  about  admitting  the  doctrine  in  question  to  be 
one  of  the  great  things  revealed  under  the  ancient  economy, 
since  good  men,  even  before  Moses,  (as  we  learn  from  Heb. 
11  :  13, 16,)  were  animated  by  views  of  a  future  state ;  as  he 
(Moses)  himself  plainly  was  (see  verses  24-26  of  the  same 
chapter)  ;  and  the  promises  of  heavenly  felicity  were  con- 
tained even  in  the  covenant  made  with  Abraham,  which 
the  Mosaic  could  not  disannul.  We  have  not  time  even  to 
refer  you  to  the  numerous  passages  of  the  Old  Testament, 
teaching,  as  we  think,  and  -plainly,  this  truth.  All  that  we 
are  concerned  to  say  at  present,  is,  that  the  historic  fact  rela- 
tive to  Enoch's  translation,  as  well  as  that  of  Elijah,  is  of 
such  a  nature  as  to  impel  us  to  infer  the  truth  respecting 
which  we  have  spoken.* 

That  our  patriarch's  soul  was  warmed  and.  set  on  fire  by 
the  contemplation  of  this  event,  so  full  of  meaning,  seems  to 
us  unquestionable  ;  and  by  it  we  may  imagine  that  he  was 
stimulated  to  become  an  imitator  of  this  wonderful  saint, 
whom  God  so  early  received  within  the  gates  of  pearl ;  and 

*  That  Old  Testament  saints  indulged  an  expectation  of  a  state  of  ex- 
istence beyond  this  life  is  indicated  in  the  following,  among  numerous 
other  passages,  viz.  :  —  Gen.  49  :  18  ;  Ps.  16  :  9-11 ;  Ps.  17  :  15 ;  Ps.  73  : 
17,  27;  Job  19:  25-27;  Eccl.  3:  15,  16,21;  Eccl.  7:  12,  18;  Isa.  3:  10, 
11;  Isa.  26:  19;  Isa.  35  :  10;  Ezek.  18:  19,21;  Dan.  12 :  2.  Let  the 
promises  of  the  Old  Testament  likewise  be  carefully  inspected.  Look,  as 
a  specimen,  at  the  following :  Dan.  12:  13 ;  Hag.  2:  23 ;  Zech.  3 :  7. 


THE   CAINITE   LINE.  33 

that  he  attained,  at  least  so  early  as  the  noon  of  life,  such  a 
character  as  to  piety,  that  what  was  said  of  Enoch  was  like- 
wise said  of  him,  —  that  he  "  walked  with  God."  (Gen.  6 :  9.) 

Just  at  what  period  of  life  Noah  became  pious,  we  are  not 
told ;  with  such  a  degree  of  information,  however,  we  are 
furnished  as  to  know  that  when  he  was  no  farther  advanced 
than  480  years,  i.  e.,  120  years  before  the  Deluge,  he  was 
signalized  for  his  piety.  So  different  was  he  then  from  all 
others  on  this  terrestrial  ball,  as  to  be  specially  distinguished 
in  the  divine  regards  and  dealings  toward  him,  (Gen.  6  :  8.) 
He  had,  without  a  peradventure,  been,  for  years  previous, 
stemming  the  tide  of  iniquity  which  had  risen  to  a  high  pitch 
some  time  before,  and  had  been  attaining  a  greater  and  still 
greater  doleful  altitude,  until  it  threatened  to  bear  every 
thing  before  it  —  sparing  nothing  of  the  semblance  of  excel- 
lence or  goodness  on  the  globe. 

To  maintain  a  character  for  pious  devotedness  in  such  a 
world  as  this,  with  so  many  obstacles  in  the  way,  is,  under 
the  now  existing  circumstances,  by  no  means  of  easy  accom- 
plishment ;  requires,  indisputably,  great  strength  of  the  reli- 
gious principle  ;  special  divine  superintendence  and  gracious 
influence.  How  much  more  difficult  to  maintain  such  a 
character,  such  an  elevation  of  the  spiritual  thermometer, 
under  the  circumstances  at  that  time  existing !  —  circum- 
stances which  we  shall  ere  long  somewhat  specially  consider. 

If  we  turn  our  attention  to  the  Cainite  branch  of  the  An- 
tediluvians, it  may  be  remarked  that  as  Cain  came  into  being 
almost  as  soon  as  his  father,  being  probably  not  more  than 
one  or  two  years  his  junior,  and  as  it  is  presumable  that  he 
was  not  for  a  greater  number  of  years  than  Adam  an  earthly 
sojourner,  he  must  have  ceased  to  be  seen  among  the  living^ 
ere  our  patriarch's  birth.  It  is  to  be  believed  also,  that 
several  of  Cain's  older  children  had  journeyed  into  the 
land  of  souls.  With  some  of  his  younger,  had  his  place  6f 
residence  been  near,  he  might  have  been  a  junior  contempo- 
rary not  only,  but  have  had  an  undesirable  acquaintance. 


34  THE   CAINITE   LINE. 

But  Cain,  from  a  sense  of  guilt ;  from  a  strong  aversion  to 
everything  having  the  semblance  of  piety ;  and  from  regard 
to  his  own  safety,  —  for  notwithstanding  what  the  Lord  had 
told  him,  he  no  doubt  had  fearful  apprehensions  of  having 
Abel's  blood  avenged  on  him,  and  consequently,  instead  of 
being  desirous  to  be  located  in  immediate  propinquity,  wished 
to  get  and  keep,  if  not  at  a  respectful,  at  least  at  an  unannoy- 
ing  and  safe  distance  from  the  other  branches  of  Adam's 
progeny,  —  from  these  causes  the  belief  is  to  be  entertained 
that  he  wandered  and  at  length  fixed  on  some  locality  as  a 
place  of  abode,  far  eastward  from  where  his  parents,  brothers 
and  sisters  had  their  residence.  Hence  our  patriarch  may 
have  come  in  contact  with  none  of  them  in  the  earlier  part 
of  his  antediluvian  sojourn.  Yet  from  childhood,  or  adoles- 
cence, he  may,  through  one  or  another  channel,  have  received 
some  information  in  regard  to  them ;  something  concerning 
the  immoralities  prevalent  among  them ;  about  their  infi- 
del opinions,  or  idolatrous  rites  and  practices  —  rites  and 
practices  which,  as  you  have  heard,  probably  originated,  if 
they  did  not  become  notorious,  so  early  as  the  days  of  Enos. 
The  sacred  penman  has  given  us  no  very  minute  or  ex- 
tended history  of  the  Cainites.  He  has  afforded  us  a  brief 
genealogical  list  —  the  names  of  the  heads  of  some  genera- 
tions —  but  did  not,  as  he  condescended  to  do  in  the  case  of 
the  Sethites,  tell  us  so  much  as  the  term  of  life  of  any  of 
them.  "  Look,"  says  Dr.  Kitto,  (Bib.  Illustrations,  vol.  1, 
p.  98,)  "  at  the  two  lists  of  the  descendants  of  Cain  and  of 
Seth  respectively.  In  the  former  are  simply  names,  inter- 
rupted by  a  snatch  of  old  verse,  by  the  account  of  some 
equivocal  proceedings  of  Lamech,  and  by  a  hint  concerning 
the  invention  of  arts.  In  the  genealogy  of  the  line  of  Seth, 
the  persons  acquire  distinct  individuality.  Not  only  the 
names  are  given,  but  how  old  they  were  when  favored  with 
a  son,  how  long  they  lived  after,  and  what  was  the  sum  of 
their  age.  The  interruptions  in  the  (Sethite)  list  have  no 
respect  to  inventions  or  any  such  matters,  but  have  reference 


THE   CAINITE   LINE.  35 

to  the  religious  character  or  religious  hopes  of  the  individ- 
uals. The  Cainite  list  is  of  the  earth,  earthy  ;  the  Sethite 
list  has  a  savor  of  heaven,  and  yet  is  of  the  highest  interest, 
being  in  fact  the  basis  of  chronology  and  history."  "  The 
righteous  shall  be  had  in  everlasting  remembrance  —  but  the 
memory  of  the  wicked  shall  rot."  I  will,  young  gentlemen, 
present  you  a  table  containing  the  genealogical  list  of  the 
Cainites,  drawn  from  Gen.  4 :  17 — 22 ;  and,  for  the  sake 
of  easy  comparison,  in  a  sort  of  parallelism,  the  genealogical 
list  of  the  Sethites.  Here  it  is  : 

ADAM EVE. 


Cain Abel * .  Seth. 


Enoch.  Enos. 

I  I 

Irad.  Cainan. 

I 

Mehujael.  Mehalaleel. 

Methusael.  Jared. 

I  I 

Adah Lamech Zillah.  Enoch. 


Methuselah. 


Jabal. .  Jubal.  .Tubal-Cam.  .Naamah. 

Lamech. 


Noah. 


Japheth Shem Ham. 


36  NOMINAL     SIMILARITIES. 

You  observe  in  this  list  some  remarkable  similarities  and 
resemblances  between  Cainites  and  Sethites  as  to  name. 
You  find,  for  instance,  the  father  of  Methuselah  bearing  the 
same  name  with  the  son  of  Cain  ;  and  the  son  of  Methuselah 
the  same  name  with  the  son  of  Methusael.  There  are  strik- 
ing resemblances  in  sound  between  other  names  of  the  two 
branches.  This  is  hardly  to  be  wondered  at,  considering  that 
there  was  but  one  language  in  existence  among  mankind 
before  the  deluge.  The  resemblances,  however,  except  in 
the  two  cases  which  are  alike,  are  rather  in  sound  than  in 
sense.  The  inference  from  resemblance,  and  from  the  import 
especially  of  the  names  given  to  some  of  Cain's  progeny,  in 
favor  of  the  piety  of  these  latter  —  an  inference  which  has 
by  some  been  drawn  —  does  not  appear  to  me  to  have  a  very 
firm  support,  —  inasmuch  as  the  religious  aspect  of  those 
names  in  the  case  of  the  Cainites  may  be,  and  probably  in 
fact  was,  that  of  idolatry. 

Something  worthy  of  note  is  given  us  in  relation  to  the 
Cainite  Lamech.  His  is  the  first  recorded  instance  of  polyg- 
amy, (Gen.  4:19;)  a  practice  which  directly  contravenes  the 
original  ordinance  of  Heaven,  that  two  only  should  con- 
stitute one  flesh;  and  for  introducing  which,  Lamech  is  con- 
demned to  infamous  notoriety  as  long  as  the  sacred  narrative 
shall  be  read.  Those  who  desert  God's  church  and  ordi- 
nances, young  gentlemen,  lay  themselves  open  to  all  manner  of 
temptation.  Highly  favored  and  blessed  are  they  who  have 
the  checks  and  restraints  which  these  impose. 

Perhaps  it  may  not  be  out  of  place  here  to  remark,  that 
the  words  of  this  Lamech  to  his  two  wives,  (Gen.  4  :  24,  25,) 
have  very  much  perplexed  biblical  interpreters.  A  tradition 
(Jewish)  says  that  Lamech,  growing  blind,  when  hunting 
killed  Cain  ignorantly,  believing  that  he  killed  some  beast ; 
and  that  afterward  he  slew  his  own  son,  Tubal-Cain,  who  had 
been  the  cause  of  this  murder,  because  he  had  directed  him 
to  shoot  at  a  certain  place  in  the  thicket  where  he  heard 
something  stir. 


THE    CAINITE   LAMECH.  37 

Onkelos,  who  wrote  the  first  Chaldee  Paraphrase  on  the 
Pentateuch,  takes  quite  a  different  view,  however,  from  this. 
He  reads  the  words  with  an  interrogation  :  "  Have  I  slain  a 
man  to  my  wounding  ?  and  a  young  man  to  my  hurt  ?  "  Ac- 
cordingly he  paraphrases  the  passage  thus :  "  I  have  not 
killed  a  man  that  I  should  bear  the  sin  of  it,  nor  have  I  de- 
stroyed a  young  man,  that  my  offspring  should  be  cut  off  for 
it."  Shuckford  has  improved  this  interpretation  by  supposing 
that  Lamech  was  endeavoring  to  reason  his  wife  and  family 
out  of  their  fear  of  having  the  death  of  Abel  revenged  upon 
them,  they  being  of  the  posterity  of  Cain.  As  if  he  had 
said,  "  What  have  we  done  that  we  should  be  afraid  ?  We 
have  not  killed  a  man,  nor  offered  any  injury  to  our  brethren 
of  any  other  family ;  and  if  God  would  not  allow  Cain  to  be 
killed,  who  had  murdered  his  brother,  but  threatened  to  take 
seven-fold  vengeance  on  any  that  should  kill  him  ;  doubtless 
they  must  expect  much  greater  punishment  who  should  pre- 
sume to  kill  any  of  us.  Therefore  we  may  surely  look  upon 
ourselves  as  safe  under  the  protection  of  the  law  and  of  the 
providence  of  God. 

As  the  Hebrew  particle  "  for  "  has  sometimes  a  conditional 
meaning  equivalent  to  if,  although,  supposing  that,  Lamech's 
words  are  susceptible  of  a  hypothetical  interpretation.  "  Sup- 
pose that  when  designedly  and  dangerously  wounded  by  a 
murderous  weapon  in  the  hand  of  a  ruffian,  I  should  slay  my 
assailant,  whether  a  grown  man  or  a  daring  youth,  yet  as  it 
would  be  done  in  self-defence,  I  should  not  incur  the  guilt 
of  murder.  For  if  the  man  that  should  have  killed  Cain, 
who  slew  his  brother  without  provocation,  were  to  be  punished 
seven-fold,  then  he  who  should  undertake  to  inflict  vengeance 
upon  me  for  slaying  a  man  in  my  own  defence,  shall  be  pun- 
ished seventy  and  seven  fold."  Thus  one  sinner  takes  liberty 
to  sin  from  the  suspension  of  judgment  toward  another.  Bush, 
in  his  note  on  the  words,  says,  "  The  speech  was  perhaps 
prompted  by  Lamech,  having  witnessed  the  mischievous 
4 


38  THE   CAINITE   LAMECH. 

effects  of  some  of  his  sons'  newly  invented  instruments  of 
iron  and  brass,  which  probably  began  to  be  wielded  to  the  in- 
jury or  destruction  of  human  life."  The  Chaldee  renders  the 
passage,  '<  For  I  have  not  killed  a  man  that  I  should  bear  sin 
for  him :  nor  destroyed  a  young  man  that  my  seed  should  be 
consumed  for  him."  The  speech  is  in  hemistichs,  according 
to  the  genius  of  the  Hebrew  poetry,  and,  as  it  seems,  was  not 
written  by  Moses,  but  handed  down  by  tradition. 

This  Lamech,  Josephus  says,  had  by  his  two  wives  seventy- 
seven  children.  How  many  soever  he  had,  the  archaic  record 
gives  us  the  names  of  but  three  sons  and  one  daughter.  Yet 
we  have  no  reason  from  this  circumstance  to  infer  that  he  had 
no  more  than  three,  any  more  than  that  the  other  antedilu- 
vians were  the  parents  of  no  other  children  than  those  whose 
names  are  on  record.  Perhaps  in  regard  to  no  one  item  do 
the  conceptions  of  ordinary  readers  come  farther  short  of  the 
reality,  than  concerning  the  number  of  the  proximate  offspring 
of  these  millenary  parents  who  lived  beyond  the  flood. 
Think  of  the  number,  we  will  not  say  of  years  merely  —  of 
centuries  —  in  which  the  process  of  pro-creation  with  parental 
couples  would  ordinarily  continue.  Josephus's  statement, 
touching  the  number  of  Lamech's  offspring,  does  not  appear 
to  us  exaggerated.  Probability  favors  the  idea  that  this 
Cainite  bigamist  was  the  father  of  a  greater  rather  than  of  a 
less  number. 

Being  the  seventh  from  Adam,  as  was  the  Sethite  Enoch, 
this  descendant  of  Cain  was  probably  a  contemporary  with  that 
holy  man ;  though,  being  possessed  of  a  very  dissimilar  char- 
acter, and  consequently  unprepared  to  ascend  with  him  in  his 
chariot  of  fire  to  paradise,  it  may  be  presumed  that  mercy 
permitted  him  to  continue  so  much  longer  an  inhabitant  of 
earth  as  to  live  four  or  five  centuries  contemporaneously  with 
Noah.  Infinite  benevolence  not  seldom  suffers  very  bad  men 
to  tarry  in  this  world  until  their  face  is  covered  with  wrinkles 
and  their  head  with  snows,  inasmuch  as  it  is  the  best  world 


ANTEDILUVIAN     ARTS.  39 

they  are  likely  ever  to  have  to  live  in.  Whether  our  patri- 
arch's ministrations  of  remonstrance  and  love  ever  reached 
this  sinner  may  be  considered  doubtful.  It  does  npt  appear 
to  me  a  wild  conjecture  that  he  died  as  he  lived  —  a  poor, 
impenitent,  unreformed  creature. 

Concerning  the  sons  of  this  Lamech  —  we  mean  the  three 
whose  names  are  given  by  the  historian  —  there  is  something 
truly  noteworthy  related :  that  is,  that  they  were  the  inven- 
tors or  special  promoters  of  useful  arts.  It  is  said  of  Jabal, 
that  he  was  "  the  father  of  such  as  dwell  in  tents,  and  have 
cattle,"  (Gen.  4:  20,)  Hebrew,  "  the  father  of  the  inhabitants 
of  the  tent,"  Chaldee,  "  the  master."  The  original  author,  de- 
viser or  founder  of  any  particular  craft  or  vocation,  is  styled 
the  father  of  such  as  prosecute  it.  The  nomadic  mode  of  life, 
although  not  entirely  unknown  before,  for  sheep  had  pre- 
viously, even  so  early  as  Abel's  time  (Gen.  4 :  2,)  been  kept, 
demanding  a  measure  of  superintending  vigilance  and  care, 
such  as  belongs  to  a  shepherd,  yet  appears  to  have  been  then 
organized  into  a  distinct  form  of  social  existence.  As  this 
mode  of  life  required  frequent  change  of  locality  for  the 
accommodation  of  the  flock  or  herd  with  renewed  supplies  of 
water  and  pasturage,  there  was  a  call  for  such  a  sort  of  hab- 
itation as  was  easy  of  erection  and  of  transfer.  Neces- 
sity, therefore,  suggested  and  at  length  led  to  the  invention 
of  tents,  in  the  room  of  more  permanent  and  costly  structures. 
Here  is  a  fact  not  unworthy  of  note,  because  of  its  bearing 
on  a  favorite  theory  of  not  a  few,  as  to  the  primeval  condition 
of  the  human  family.  Instead  of  the  rude  tent,  pertaining 
specially  to  the  roving,  savage  mode  of  life,  being  of  earliest 
invention  or  adoption,  thirteen  centuries  passed  ere  this  sort 
of  structure  was  known.  Fixed  habitations  were  of  prior 
origin,  and  these  in  such  clusters  sometimes  as  to  constitute 
cities  and  villages  —  a  mode  of  life  indicating  the  higher  con- 
dition of  social  being.  Indeed,  the  first  born  man,  mark  it, 
built  a  city,  (Gen.  4:  17)  ;  the  tent  came  later  by  more  than 


40  ANTEDILUVIAN    ARTS. 

a  thousand  years.  Cast  this  fact,  young  gentlemen,  you  may 
in  the  teeth  of  those  who  would  warmly  contend  for  the,  to 
them,  fond  hypothesis  that  man  advanced  progressively  to 
civilization  from  a  savage  state.  Houses  preceded  tents; 
towns  and  cities  went  before  encampments ;  the  settled  was 
anterior  to  the  wandering  and  nomadic  life.  Confirmatory  of 
this,  our  first  father,  immediately  upon  leaving  the  garden, 
entered  on  agriculture  (Gen.  3 :  23)  —  an  employment  not 
favorite  with  savages,  and  one  demanding  a  fixed  residence. 

Of  Jabot,  another  son  of  the  polygamist,  it  is  narrated  that 
he  "  was  the  father  of  all  such  as  handle  the  harp  and  organ," 
(Gen.  4  ;  21).  It  is  not  to  be  imagined  that  the  ear  of  an 
antediluvian  had  never  been  previously  regaled  by  strains  of 
melody.  Not  only  had  the  feathered  songsters  been  pouring 
forth,  from  the  beginning,  their  notes  of  sweetness,  but  the 
human  voice  had  oft  charmed  the  listener  with  its  ravishing 
music.  But  now  appears  to  have  been  the  period  when 
instruments  were  invented  to  aid  the  human  voice,  or  add  to 
the  pleasures  of  man  by  enlarging  the  resources  of  this  choice 
fine  art, — instruments  of  greater  compass  or  power  than 
men's  vocal  organs.  Upon  the  precise  form  and  construction 
of  those  instruments  of  which  Jubal  is  here  said  to  have 
been  the  inventor,  there  can  of  course  be  no  pronouncing 
with  certainty.  The  harp  was  doubtless  a  stringed  instru- 
ment played  upon  by  the  hand,  as  was  David's,  or,  as  Jose- 
phus  intimates,  with  the  plectrum  or  bow. 

The  organ  which  Jubal  invented  and  gave  instruction 
upon,  is  not  to  be  supposed  to  resemble  the  modern  instru- 
ment bearing  that  name.  It  was  a  wind  instrument  composed 
probably  of  a  few  pipes  of  unequal  length  and  thickness, 
joined  together  ;  being  nearly  identical  with  the  pipe  of  Pan 
among  the  Greeks,  or  that  simple  instrument  termed  a  mouth- 
organ,  which  is  still  in  common  use  in  some  parts  of  Europe. 
For  my  sake,  as  well  as  yours,  we  here  conclude  the  evening's 
Exercise. 


EVENING   THIRD. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

You  remember  the  topic  with  which  we  closed  the  last 
Exercise.  Tubal-cain,  another  son  of  Lamech,  the  bigamist, 
but  by  a  different  wife,  the  sacred  narrator  introduces  to  our 
notice  as  "  an  instructor  of  every  artificer  in  brass  and  iron," 
(Gen.  4:  22).  As  brass  is  a  factitious  metal,  composed  of 
copper  and  zinc,  it  may  be  believed  that  instead  of  it,  literally, 
copper  is  here  meant.  Observe  you  will  that  this  artificer  is 
not  here  spoken  of  as  the  "father"  or  inventor  of  the  art  of 
working  these  metals.  It  is  hardly  to  be  presumed  that  all 
the  agricultural  and  architectural  operations  prior  to  his  time 
could  have  been  prosecuted  without  any  use  of  metals.  The 
language  does  not  imply  this.  But  from  it  we  are  led  to 
believe  that  this  man  so  greatly  improved  the  art,  and  so 
excelled  in  the  manufacture  of  the  various  implements  of 
husbandry,  architecture,  and  other  instruments  of  utility  and 
convenience,  and  —  as  this  was  getting  to  be  a  period  of 
violence  —  weapons  of  attack  and  defence,  that  he  became 
famous  for  his  ingenuity  and  skill,  and  a  very  successful 
instructor  of  others.  From  the  name  of  this  artificer  is 
thought  to  be  derived  the  Vulcan  of  the  Greeks,  the  fabled 
god  of  smiths.  So  great  appear  to  have  been  Tubal-cain's 
improvements  in  metallurgy,  and  so  useful  a  man  to  have 
become  in  his  line,  that  scarcely  an  ancient  nation  can  be  found 
that  has  not  preserved  some  traditional  notices  of  him. 


42  ANTEDILUVIAN     ARTS. 

Of  a  sister  of  Tubal-cain  the  pen  of  the  sacred  historian 
makes  mention  —  but  gives  us  naught  concerning  her  but  her 
name.  Yet  this,  be  it  observed,  is  more  than  is  said  of  any 
of  the  fairer  sex  save  three,  from  the  Creation  down  to  this 
time.  Tradition  says  more  of  her  than  does  Moses,  yet  even 
it  is  very  taciturn  concerning  her  —  only  reporting  that  she 
was  the  inventor  of  the  arts  of  spinning  and  weaving.  The 
word  Naamah  signifies  fair  or  beautiful.  Was  her  beauty 
productive  of  such  effects  as  to  lead  to  the  inscription  of  her 
name  on  such  a  tablet  ?  or  what  else  was  the  cause  of  its 
mention  ?  Let  those  who  would  fain  find  out  the  cause  of 
everything,  enlighten  us  in  this  simple  matter,  if  they  can  in 
weightier  things  about  which  Scripture  is  silent.  "  To  what 
she  owed  her  fame,"  says  one,  —  "a  fame  of  6000  years  — 
must  remain  inscrutable.  As  one  finds  among  the  ruins  of 
time  some  old  gray  monument,  too  important  and  distin- 
guished to  have  been  constructed  for  a  person  of  mean  note, 
but  discovers  thereon  only  a  NAME,  which  the  rust  of  ages 
has  left  unconsumed  —  so  is  it  with  Lamech's  illustrious 
daughter." 

Whether  among  the  Sethites,  and  other  lines  of  Adam's 
descendants,  arts  were  equally  the  object  of  attention,  we  are 
not  in  possession  of  the  necessary  data  for  definitely  ascer- 
taining. It  is  hardly  to  be  supposed  that  they  were  inferior 
to  the  Cainites  in  inventive  genius  or  in  enterprise ;  but  as 
the  sacred  annalist  could  find  something  of  a  higher  nature 
to  record  in  reference  to  the  Sethites,  even  the  exalted,  sub- 
lime things  of  religion ;  and  as  he  could  discover  naught 
better  to  proclaim  of  the  Cainites,  than  that  among  at  least 
a  portion  of  them,  arts  were  cultivated  —  he  may  thence  have 
been  led  to  be  entirely  incommunicative  or  taciturn  on  this 
point  respecting  the  former.  It  is,  indeed,  possible  that  the 
absence  of  regard  for  higher  interests  may  have  so  directed 
all  mental  force,  among  the  progeny  of  Cam,  into  the  chan- 
nel alluded  to,  as  that  they  may  have  excelled  the  other 


ANTEDILUVIAN    SCIENCE.  43 

branches  of  Adam's  family,  particularly  the  progeny  of  Seth, 
in  this  particular. 

On  the  whole, — from  the  intimations  already  referred  to 
in  the  brief  antediluvian  annals  upon  the  subject ;  from  the 
amount  of  knowledge  imparted  to  our  great  primogenitor  at 
the  first,  and  subsequently  added  to,  progressively,  during  his 
protracted  career ;  from  the  length  of  antediluvian  life,  pre- 
senting a  rare  opportunity  for  advancement  in  this  respect ; 
from  the  facility  afforded  by  universal  and  entire  uniformity 
of  language ;  from  the  vast  extent  as  to  numbers  as  well  as 
territory  to  which  the  population  of  the  world  before  the 
Flood  must  have  reached ;  from  the  necessity  of  their  inven- 
tion and  cultivation  largely  in  order  to  the  sustenance,  not  to 
say  comfort,  of  said  population  ;  from  the  fact,  additionally, 
of  which  we  are  put  in  possession  by  the  record,  respecting 
the  building  of  a  vessel  of  such  construction,  and  so  im- 
mense dimensions  and  capacity,  as  the  ark  —  requiring  some 
variety  as  well  as  perfection  of  mechanical  facilities,  as  well 
as  knowledge  and  skill  in  their  application  and  use  ;  together 
with  the  far  from  diminutive  enterprises,  the  great,  magnifi- 
cent undertakings  of  Noah's  descendants  so  soon  after  the 
deluge  as  the  Scriptures  intimate, — from  all  these  circum- 
stances combined,  we  have  forced  upon  us  the  conclusion, 
that  the  arts  must  have  arrived,  during  the  antediluvian 
period,  at  quite  a  prominent  and  far-reaching  stage  of  ad- 
vancement. 

And  what  shall  we  say  concerning  antediluvian  science  ? 
Why,  such  a  question  is  of  itself  sufficient  to  ereate  a  smile 
on  the  ruddy  faces  of  those  who  are  accustomed  to  imagine 
the  primal  state  of  man  to  have  been  one  of  savageism. 
Men  of  this  idea  find  it  extremely  difficult  to  conceive  how 
the  human  kind  could  have  succeeded  in  emerging  from  their 
caves  and  forests,  and  approximating  in  any  considerable  de- 
gree a  state  of  civilization,  in  a  period  so  short  as  that  inter- 
vening between  the  creation  and  the  deluge.  As  we  are  so 


44  ANTEDILUVIAN   SCIENCE. 

feeble-minded  as  to  believe  that  Moses  did  not  write  a  book  of 
fables ;  or  that  man  was  first  a  savage  —  or,  as  some  savans 
have  seemed  sincerely  to  imagine  —  a  monad,  or  at  most  an 
ape ;  as  we  believe  savageism  to  be  a  degeneracy  from  a 
primal  state  of  high  civilization ;  and  was,  if  we  except  mor- 
ally, unknown  until  some  time  posterior  to  the  Flood  —  we 
thence  feel  no  special  reluctance  to  the  dropping  of  a  few 
words  about  what  we  a  moment  ago  hinted  at,  viz.,  the  state 
of  science  among  the  antediluvians.  From  what  has  been 
said  by  us  respecting  the  advanced  stage  to  which  the  arts 
attained  in  the  first  age  of  the  world,  it  is  to  be  inferred  that 
those  sciences  bearing  particularly  on  practical  life,  must 
have  h  :d  some  sort  of  existence,  and  even  have  made  consid- 
erable progress  —  since  science,  if  not  in  form,  yet  in  sub- 
stance, must  lie  at  the  basis  of  and  give  birth  to  them.  But 
not  alone  those  sciences  bearing  the  most  intimate  relation  to 
the  arts  are  we  compelled  to  infer  to  have  had  an  exclusive 
existence.  The  Mosaic  history  affords  us  such  intimations  as 
to  lead  us  to  the  conclusion  that  others  were  not  altogether 
unknown.  Availing  ourselves  of  those  intimations,  we  pro- 
ceed to  observe,  first,  that  if  our  primeval  progenitor  was 
possessed  of  such  an  acquaintance  with  zoology  as  we  are  con- 
strained from  Gen.  2 :  20  to  believe  he  was,  it  is  not  irrational 
to  conclude  that  he  would  not  be  so  mute,  selfish,  or  regard- 
less of  what  related  to  the  comfort  and  elevation  of  those 
immediately  descending  from  him,  as  to  impart  none  of  his 
knowledge  of  this  interesting  branch  to  them.  And  if  be 
gave  them  instruction  in  this  science,  it  is  equally  probable 
that  they  would  not  altogether  fail  to  give  tuition  to  their 
offspring.  And  thus  an  acquaintance  with  this  science  would 
in  greater  or  less  measure  be  transmitted  from  one  genera- 
tion to  another  till  the  time  of  the  Flood,  and  through  our 
patriarch  to  cis-diluvian  times.  Nor  are  we  left  without 
at  least  some  feeble  intimations  in  the  Mosaic  record,  that 


ANTEDILUVIAN    SCIENCE.  45 

the  science  of  astronomy  was  not  altogether  unknown  among 
the  inhabitants  of  the  Old  World.  Time,  for  instance,  was 
evidently,  even  then,  divided  into  days,  and  months,  and 
years  ;  into  summer  and  winter ;  and  it  is  reasonable  to  infer 
that  the  causes  of  such  changes  as  originated  these  divisions 
would  not  wholly  escape  the  investigating  notice  of  that  man 
who  came  directly  from  the  Creator's  hands,  and  was,  by  the 
same  Being  that  formed  him,  endowed  confessedly  on  other 
subjects  with  no  inconsiderable  share  of  knowledge.  And  if 
he  after  any  manner  became  the  possessor  of  some  knowledge 
in  this  department,  a  transmission  of  it  would  be  made  to  his 
proximate  offspring,  and  by  them  to  theirs,  and  so  onward  ; 
and  thus  no  one  of  the  generations  of  the  Old  World  would 
fail  to  be  reached  by  some  measure  of  instruction  relative  to 
the  subject.  Josephus  says,  —  not  Moses,  —  you  may  there- 
fore give  as  much  or  as  little  weight  to  it  as  you  please,  — 
that  they  of  Seth's  time,  "  were  the  inventors  of  that  peculiar 
sort  of  wisdom  which  is  concerned  with  the  heavenly  bodies 
and  their  order "  —  in  other  words,  were  the  cultivators  of 
the  science  of  astronomy.  (Ant.  ch.  2,  p.  27.)  Again ;  if 
the  prime  head  and  educator  of  the  antediluvians  —  our  first 
father  —  had  not  a  formal  and  full  acquaintance  with,  yet 
that  he  had  a  knowledge  of  some  essential  principles  in  bot- 
any, is  shown  by  the  fact  that  he  knew  how  to  distinguish 
"  seed-bearing  herb  "  and  "  tree  in  which  is  a  seed-bearing 
fruit,"  with  "  every  green  herb."  (Gen.  1  :  29,  30.)  In  the 
history  of  Noah  we  are  furnished  with  intimations  not  only 
that  he  was  so  well  acquainted  with  zoology -as  to  distinguish 
between  "  clean  and  unclean  beasts,"  and  to  execute  the  office 
of  receiving  into  the  ark  a  specified  number  of  every  kind  of 
living  creature  —  to  do  which  without  mistake  in  any  instance 
would  require  no  small  measure  of.  zoological  knowledge,  — 
but,  it  would  seem  that  of  botanic  science,  particularly  of  some 
of  its  important  elements,  this  our  patriarch  could  not  have 
4* 


46  '     ORIGIN    OF   ALPHABETIC    WRITING. 

been  very  ignorant.  The  vine,  the  olive,  the  gopher,  are 
spoken  of  in  such  a  manner  as  clearly  to  intimate  a  knowledge 
of  their  qualities.  In  regard  to  mineralogy  let  us  in  a  word  re- 
mark that  the  antediluvian  population  were  at  least  possessed 
of  such  a  measure  of  knowledge  of  it  as  to  distinguish  met- 
als, and  understood  the  leading  qualities  of  the  more  import- 
ant of  them. 

The  question  has  been  much  agitated  among  savans, 
When  and  where  originated  Alphabetic  Writing  ?  So  ad- 
mirable and  useful  is  this  art,  that  in  the  absence  of  reliable 
historic  testimony  tending  to  its  decision,  we  cannot  reasona- 
bly be  surprised  at  it.  As  has  been  the  case  in  regard  to 
numerous  other  matters,  different  nations  of  antiquity  have 
claimed  the  honor  of  its  invention.  The  pretensions  of  no 
one  of  them  have  appeared  to  have  anything  very  substantial 
to  sustain  them.  *  That  the  art  is  quite  ancient  no  one  does  or 
can  dispute.  A  large  number  of  writers,  Jewish  and  Chris- 
tian, ancient  and  modern,  have  contented  themselves  with 
tracing  its  origin  to  the  time  of  Moses,  —  alleging  that  God 
taught  him  the  form  and  use  of  alphabetic  letters  in  the  ex- 
emplar of  the  two  tables  containing  the  Decalogue,  written, 
as  the  text  assures  us,  with  the  finger  of  God,  whatever 
interpretation  may  be  given  to  that  form  of  expression.  In- 
deed, on  this  very  expression  some  have  essayed  to  found  an 
argument  in  favor  of  its  origination  at  the  time  of  that  stu- 
pendous Sinaitic  transaction.  The  main  arguments  in  support 
of  the  position  that  the  art  of  alphabetic  writing  was  commu- 
nicated to  the  great  Jewish  leader  at  the  period  alluded  to, 
may  be  found  set  forth  by  Dr.  Winder,  in  his  History  of 
Knowledge.  If  so  important  an  art  had  an  existence  before 
the  Flood,  it  seems  amazing  to  those  entertaining  this  opin- 
ion, that,  whilst  inferior  arts  are  noticed,  no  mention  of  it 
should  be  discoverable  in  the  record  of  those  earlier  times. 
And  between  the  Flood  and  the  giving  of  the  Law  at  Sinai 


ORIGIN    OF   ALPHABETIC    WRITING.  47 

there  were  various  periods  and  transactions,  say  they,  during 
which,  had  alphabetical  letters  existed,  they  would  not  only 
have  been  of  the  greatest  utility,  but  next  to  indispensable, 
and  could  scarcely  fail  of  being  mentioned.  Such  periods  and 
events  were  some  of  those  occurring  between  the  Deluge  and 
the  departure  of  Abraham  from  Chaldea  ;  at  the  subsequent 
death  of  Sarah  in  Canaan,  when  Abraham  bought  the  cave 
of  Ephron  from  the  sons  of  Heth  —  verbal  exclusively  the 
whole  transaction ;  at  the  time  of  Isaac's  marriage,  or  the 
event  of  his  league  with  Gerar,  when  Jacob  went  to,  tarried 
with,  or  returned  from  Laban ;  the  affair  of  Joseph's  trans- 
fer to  Egypt,  his  servitude,  and  his  preferment  there ;  the 
descent  of  the  Israelitish  family  to  that  land,  their  heavy 
oppression,  and  the  stupendous  miracles  connected  with  their 
deliverance.  Not  only  is  there  no  written  mention  made  of 
these  at  the  period  of  their  occurrence,  but  all  these  trans- 
actions, and  all  the  correspondence  between  the  parties,  as 
well  as  all  the  communications  of  Heaven,  were  effected  by 
verbal  intercourse. 

A  common  additional  argument  in  favor  of  so  compara- 
tively late  a  date  of  the  origin  of  the  art  we  are  speaking  of, 
is  the  absence  of  any  special  necessity  for  the  existence  of 
such  an  art  in  order  to  the  transmission  of  information  to 
succeeding  times,  at  a  period  when  the  lives  of  individuals 
extended  to  wellnigh  a  thousand  years.  By  three  persons, 
for  example  —  Adam,  Methuselah,  Shem  —  could  be  handed 
forward  to  Abraham  and  his  times  all  the  knowledge  attained 
by  them  of  transactions  occurring  during  the  interval  of  two 
thousand  years  and  more  from  the  Creation.  How  differ- 
ent this  from  having  to  rely  for  information,  concerning  the 
incidents  of  so  protracted  a  season,  on  the  testimony  of  the 
memories  of  a  great  number  of  persons.  Urged  likewise  it 
might  be,  that  such,  in  various  other  respects,  was  the  state 
of  things  in  the  earlier  periods  of  the  world,  as  little  to  de- 


48  ORIGIN    OF   ALPHABETIC    WRITING. 

mand  the  existence  of  sucli  an  art  as  that  of  writing  —  par- 
ticularly that  of  alphabetic  writing.* 

On  the  other  hand :  For  the  earlier  existence  of  this  art 
the  following  arguments  may  be,  and  most  if  not  all  of  them 
have  been,  urged. 

1st.  The  silence  of  Scripture  upon  the  subject  would  sug- 
gest that  so  important  and  essential  an  art  had  been  known 
before  —  otherwise  the  archaic  historian  would  probably 
have  added  this  extraordinary  and  divine  revelation  to  the 
other  parts  of  his  information  respecting  the  transactions  of 
Sinai. 

2d.  The  population  of  the  world  became  so  multitudinous, 
and  so  widely  dispersed,  some  time  anterior  to  the  flood,  as 
to  render  very  desirable  and  requisite  some  other  mode  of 
communication  than  the  traditional  or  oral. 

*  The  facilities  for  communicating  or  handing  down  information,  orally, 
from  the  time  of  Adam  to  that  of  Abraham,  may  be  perceived  by  a  glance 
at  the  following  table. 

Adam  was  contemporary  with 

Years. 
Lamcch, 56 

Methuselah, 243 

Jared, 470 

Mahalaleel, 535 

Cainan, 605 

Enos, 695 

Noah  was  contemporary  with 

Years. 

Lamech, 595 

Methuselah, 600 

Jared, 366 

Mahalaleel, 234 

Cainan, 179 

Enos, 84 

Shem  was  contemporary  with 

Lamech, , 93* 

Methuselah, , 93 

Noah 448 

Abraham, 150 


ORIGIN    OF   ALPHABETIC    WRITING.  49 

3d.  In  the  first  ages  of  the  world  it  would  be  inexpressi- 
bly important  to  preserve,  in  some  fixed  or  stable  form,  the 
knowledge  of  God,  of  creation,  of  the  fall,  &c.,  &c.  Few 
persons  repeat  a  thing  in  the  precise  words  in  which  a  detail 
was  given  to  them  ;  and  the  most  trifling  change  in  expres- 
sion may  either  destroy  or  much  alter  the  sense.  It  was  a 
matter  of  vast  moment  that  the  most  exact  account  should 
have  been  preserved  of  the  creation  of  the  world,  the  apostacy 
of  man,  &c.,  as  well  as  many  prophecies  of  deepest  interest  to 
unborn  generations.  Lists  of  numbers,  genealogical  lists, 
such,  for  instance,  as  are  to  be  found  in  the  5th,  10th,  and  llth 
chapters  of  Genesis  —  lists,  chronologically,  as  well  as  other- 
wise, of  immense  consequence,  —  would  hardly  be  entrusted 
to  uncertain  memory,  solely,  to  transmit  to  future  times. 
"  The  book  of  the  genealogy  "  of  the  antediluvian  patriarchs 
is  evidently  represented  as  a  written  record,  (Gen.  5:1.) 
Inspect,  in  that  5th  chapter,  the  record  of  their  names,  their 
generations,  residues  of  life,  and  total  ages.  Is  it  probable  that 
these  all,  embracing  thirty  large  and  unconnected  numbers, 
rising  from  100  to  near  1000  years,  would  be  left  to  be  hand- 
ed down  to  the  days  of  Moses  by  oral  tradition  merely  ? 
Nor  is  it  scarcely  to  be  credited  that  a  history  of  centuries, 
including  minute  circumstances,  changes,  and  conversations 
in  many  different  countries,  would  be  entrusted  to  any  barely 
verbal  medium  of  transmission. 

4th.  The  opinion  has  been  entertained  by  some  writers  of 
distinction  —  Dr.  J.  Pye  Smith  is  of  the  number  —  that 
Moses  received  important  aid  in  writing  the  earlier  part  of 
the  history  he  penned,  from  previously  existing  docu- 
ments —  several  distinct  compositions,  marked  by  their  dif- 
ferences of  style  and  by  express  formularies  of  commence- 
ment. The  eminent  author  just  named  refers  us  to  the  fol- 
lowing apparently  distinct  compositions,  requesting  it  to  be 
observed,  however,  that  the  evidence  is  not  equally  clear  in 
every  case,  viz.,  First :  Gen.  1 :  1  to  2  :  3  ;  Second,  2  :  4  to 


50  ORIGIN    OF  ALPHABETIC    WRITING. 

3:24;  Third,  ch.  4 ;  Fourth,  5 :  1  to  6 :  8  ;  Fifth,  6  :  .9  to 
9  :  29  ;  Sixth,  ch.  10  ;  Seventh,  9  :  1-9  ;  Eighth,  9  :  10- 
26.  Chapter  36th,  of  Genesis,  is  also  regarded  by  him  as  a 
separate  document.  This  opinion  relative  to  separate  docu- 
ments is  maintained  also  by  Calmet.  It  strikes  some  as  an 
objection  to  this  view,  that  it  seems  to  carry  with  it  an  im- 
pingement of  the  inspiration  of  Moses.  This  however  does 
by  no  means  follow,  any  more  than  a  quotation  from  a  heathen 
author  by  Paul  (see  Acts  17 :  28)  is  to  be  properly  consid- 
ered to  militate  against  the  inspiration  of  that  apostle. 

5th.  It  is  believed  that  the  Book  of  Job  is  the  most  ancient 
written  document  extant.  Job  himself  lived,  I  know  not  how 
long  before,  but  certainly  before  the  Exode.  Hales  says  two 
hundred  years  before.  Our  version  of  the  Scriptures  fixes 
the  time  of  this  patriarch  at  B.  C.  1520,  i.  e.,  29  years  anterior 
£o  the  departure  of  the  Israelites  from  Egypt.  Now  in 
perusing  the  book  going  under  his  name,  you  will  find  decla- 
rations proving  that  letters  and  looks  were  known  to  him  and 
his  countrymen,  —  who  were  a  people  quite  distinct  from  the 
Hebrews.  Look  at  Job  19  :  23,  24 ;  "  Oh  that  my  words 
were  now  written !  Oh  that  they  were  printed  in  a  book ! 
that  they  were  graven  with  an  iron  pen  and  lead,  in  the  rock 
forever."  Also,  Job  31:  35;  "Oh  that  mine  adversary 
had  written  a  book."  Could  such  expressions  have  been  used, 
—  would  they  have  had  any  meaning,  if  the  art  of  writing 
had  been  then  unknown  ?  And  could  there  have  been  even 
such  terms  as  book  and  pen,  or  what  these  terms  indicated, 
had  the  things  themselves  no  existence?  If  then  it  be 
granted  that  the  Book  of  Job  was  written,  and  such  expres- 
sions were  current,  anterior  to  the  Exode,  it  becomes  evident 
from  Sacred  History  that  writing  was  not  only  in  use  before 
the  law  was  given  on  Mt.  Sinai,  but  that  it  was  also  known 
amongst  other  patriarchal  tribes  than  the  children  of  Israel. 
Lightfoot  and  others  think  that  Elihu  wrote  the  book  of  Job. 
Now  he  was  a  descendant  of  Nahor,  the  brother  of  Abraham, 


ORIGIN    OF   ALPHABETIC    WRITING.  51 

and  might  thus  be  possessed  of  whatsoever  arts  the  family  of 
Terah  had  inherited  from  Noah.  In  Job  9  :  25,  the  patri- 
arch exclaims,  "  My  days  are  swifter  than  a  post."  Does 
not  this  imply  the  regular  transmission,  from  place  to  place, 
of  written  intelligence  by  appointed  messengers  ? 

6th.  Prior  to  the  giving  of  the  law  at  Sinai,  Moses  had 
been  commanded  to  write  the  important  transactions  which 
occurred  during  the  progress  of  the  Israelites  from  Egypt 
to  Canaan.  "  And  the  Lord  said  unto  Moses,  Write  this  for 
a  memorial  in  a  book."  An  account  of  the  discomfiture  of 
the  Amalekites  is  the  first  thing  said  to  have  been  written  by 
the  historian.  This  battle  was  fought  ere  the  people  left 
Rephidim,  (Ex.  17 :  13,  14,)  whence  they  departed  into  the 
wilderness  of  Sinai. 

7th.  Another  argument  which  we  will  present  on  this  side 
of  the  question  is  the  following :  One  of  the  places  conquered 
by  the  Israelites  after  they  entered  Canaan  was  Debir,  the 
original  name  of  which  was  Kirjath-sepher,  the  meaning  of 
which  is,  the  City  of  Books  ;  or  Kirjath-sannah,  the  City  of 
Letters,  (Josh.  15  :  49  :  Judges  1:1.)  Where  could  the 
Canaanites  have  obtained  their  knowledge  of  letters  or  of 
books  ?  Not  from  the  Hebrews,  with  whom  they  were 
unacquainted,  or  at  war.  From  other  sources  they  must 
have  derived  them.  Being  descended  from  Canaan,  the 
son  of  Ham,,  the  Canaanites  had  probably  preserved  and 
cultivated  the  same  arts  and  sciences  which  Mizraim,  another 
son  of  Ham,  carried  into  Egypt,  (Gen.  10 :  6.) 

If,  young  gentlemen,  after  duly  weighing  the  arguments 
which  have  been  presented  by  us  on  both  sides  of  this  inter- 
esting question,  you  should  on  the  whole  conclude  that  alpha- 
betic writing  originated  at  a  period  at  least  earlier  than  the 
giving  of  the  law  at  Sinai ;  a  question  still  remains  to  be 
agitated,  whether  its  origin  was  so  early  as  before  the  Deluge^ 
or  at  least  as  to  fall  within  the  lifetime  of  our  patriarch. 

Some  of  the  arguments  already  advanced  you  have  ob- 


52  ORIGIN   OF  ALPHABETIC    WRITING. 

served  to  favor  the  opinion  that  it  was  not  unknown  in  ante- 
diluvian times. 

Was  there  a  genuine  book  of  Enoch  ?  Did  that  man  of 
God,  the  seventh  from  Adam,  write  one?  If  it  could  be 
determined  that  he  did,  it  would  carry  the  origin  of  writing, 
either  alphabetic  or  symbolic,  to  within  a  period  less,  at  least, 
than  1000  years  after  the  creation,  and  so  prior  to  Noah's 
time. 

In  the  earlier  part  of  this  Exercise,  allusion  was  made  to 
what  Josephus  has  said  respecting  the  inventions  and  discov- 
eries of  the  Sethites  in  Astronomy.  That  historian  has 
added  :  "  And  that  their  inventions  and  discoveries  might  not 
be  lost  before  they  were  sufficiently  known,  —  upon  Adam's 
prediction  that  the  world  was  to  be  destroyed,  at  one  time  by 
water,  and  at  another  by  fire,  they  (the  Sethites)  made  two 
pillars,  the  one  of  brick,  the  other  of  stone ;  they  inscribed 
the  discoveries  upon  them  both,  that  in  case  the  pillar  of 
brick,  should  be  destroyed  by  the  flood,  the  pillar  of  stone 
might  remain,  and  exhibit  those  discoveries  to  mankind ;  and 
also  inform  them  that  there  was  another  pillar  of  brick 
erected  by  them.  Now,"  adds  Josephus,  "  this  remains  in 
the  land  of  Siriad  to  this  day." 

If  any  faith  were  to  be  reposed  in  this  statement  of  Jose- 
phus, it  would  go  to  confirm  the  idea  that  writing  of  some 
form  or  sort  was  not  unknown  or  unpractised  before  the  flood. 
We  acknowledge  it  to  be  a  flimsy  basis  on  which  to  erect  an 
argument.  The  story  does  not,  in  our  view,  possess  the 
strongest  marks  of  verity.  If  all  mankind  were  to  be  de- 
stroyed by  water,  there  would  then  be  none  to  whom  those 
records  on  the  pillars  could  be  conveyed  after  the  flood ;  — 
if  not  all  mankind,  then  those  remaining  could  have  otherwise 
conveyed  to  the  postdiluvian  world,  a  knowledge  of  the  in- 
ventions or  discoveries,  the  arts  and  sciences,  whatsoever 
they  might  be,  of  the  Old  World.  Besides,  those  Sethites 
who  could  have  faith  enough  to  erect  such  pillars,  and  exe- 


DATE    OF   THE    SABBATIC    INSTITUTION.  53 

cute  such  inscriptions,  would  also  be  apt  so  to  heed  and  profit 
by  the  warning  or  prophecy,  whether  coming  from  Adam  or 
Noah,  as  to  prepare  to  escape  the  destruction,  and,  by  a  pro- 
longation of  their  life,  convey  to  the  New  World,  a  knowledge 
of  all  that  was  valuable  as  to  science  or  art,  invention  or 
discovery,  of  the  Old. 

Some  Jewish  and  oriental  traditions  ascribe  the  invention 
of  writing  to  Seth,  the  son  of  Adam  ;  others  to  the  Sethite 
Enoch ;  but  little  or  no  weight  is  to  be  attached  to  them. 
Yet  they  do  show  this,  that  there  was  an  opinion  prevailing 
to  a  greater  or  less  extent,  anciently,  that  letters  were  not  of 
postdiluvian  date.  In  conclusion  on  this  topic,  let  us  in  a 
word  remark,  that  I  know  not  how  many  have,  along  with 
Calmet,  been  inclined  to  entertain  the  idea  that  alphabetic 
writing  was  not,  any  more  than  oral  language,  of  human  in- 
vention ;  and  that  when  God  gave  the  one,  he  communicated 
also  that  invaluable  boon,  the  other. 

We  know  not  where,  preferably,  to  introduce  the  question, 
Had  Noah  and  his  contemporaries  any  knowledge  of  the 
Sabbatic  Institution  ?  Had  that  choice  means  of  moral  re- 
straint and  improvement,  and  of  the  cultivation  of  a  right  spirit 
toward  the  Infinite  One,  an  existence  so  early  as  antedilu- 
vian times  ?  It  is  possible  that  such  an  interrogatory  may 
have  a  startling  effect  upon  the  mind  of  some  that  hear  me. 
You  have  all,  probably,  been  accustomed  to  regard  the 
statement  made  in  Gen.  2  :  3  as  the  history  of  an  occurrence 
taking  place  immediately  after  the  six  days*  work  of  creation 
was  completed ;  that  at  that  so  ancient  period  the  Sabbath 
was  instituted.  Several  biblical  interpreters,  however,  have 
not  been  of  this  opinion,  to  which  number  belonged,  for 
instance,  Limborch,  Leclerc,  and  Archdeacon  Paley.  These 
have  regarded  the  passage  in  Genesis  just  referred  to,  as  pro- 
leptical  or  anticipatory,  and  referring  to  the  period  when  the 
law  of  the  Sabbath,  along  with  other  legal  institutions,  was 
given  to  the  Israelites  in  the  wilderness.  It  does  indeed 


54  DATE    OP   THE    SABBATIC    INSTITUTION. 

seem  a  somewhat  remarkable  circumstance,  that  there  is  by  the 
sacred  historian*  no  direct  mention  made  of  the  Sabbath  be- 
tween Gen.  2  :  3,  and  Ex.  16:23.  It  is  this  silence  of  the  his- 
torian that  is  urged  as  a  principal  argument  in  favor  of  the 
sentiment  to  which  we  have  adverted.  Yet  that  declaration  in 
the  second  chapter  of  Genesis  has  in  itself  every  appearance 
of  being  in  the  strictest  sense  historic  —  in  other  words,  as 
relating  an  event  occurring  immediately  after  the  creation . 
and  the  reason  assigned  there  for  its  institution,  "  Because 
that  in  it  he  (the  Lord)  rested  from  all  his  work  which  God 
created  and  made,"  does  satisfactorily  to  our  mind  indicate  it. 
As  to  that  silence  of  Moses  to  which  allusion  has  been  made, 
it  appears  to  us  that  it  cannot  warrant  our  inferring  that  the 
Sabbath  was  not  known  or  at  all  observed  by  pious  pa- 
triarchs of  earliest  times,  since  probability  is  far  from  favor- 
ing the  idea  that  they  had  no  stated  time  for  rest  or  devotion ; 
or  that  they  were  left  destitute  of  so  salutary  an  institution. 
Besides,  it  might  be  argued  on  the  same  principle,  that 
the  Sabbath  was  wholly  lost  sight  of  or  unobserved  from 
Moses  to  David,  since  in  the  history  of  that  so  great  inter- 
vening period  there  is  no  mention  of  the  day.  On  the  same 
ground,  moreover,  it  might  be  pleaded  that  among  the  Israelites 
there  was  no  recognition  or  observance  of  the  rite  of  circum- 
cision from  their  settlement  in  Canaan  to  the  circumcision  of 
Christ,  since  no  notice  is  taken  of  such  a  thing  in  all  that 
intervening  time.  Again:  There  are  not  obscure  indica- 
tions that  the  hebdomadal  division  of  time  was  observed  by 
the  early  patriarchs,  and  that  the  Sabbath  was  regarded  as 
the  day  for  religious  worship.  Look  at  Gen.  4:  3,  "  And  in 
process  of  time,"  &c.  The  words  rendered  "  in  process  of 
time  "  literally  signify  "  at  the  end  of  days  ; "  or,  "  at  the 
cutting  off  of  days  "  —  at  the  close  of  a  section  of  days  — 
a  very  natural  expression  for  the  end  of  a  week.  If  such  be 
the  meaning,  it  would  seem  to  refer  to  the  division  of  time 
just  previously  mentioned,  and  also  the  use  of  this  day  for 


DATE    OF    THE     SABBATIC    INSTITUTION.  55 

sacred  exercises.  The  same  hebdomadal  division  of  time 
appears  to  have  been  observed  by  our  patriarch.  The  com- 
mand to  enter  the  ark  was  given  seven  days  ere  the  coming 
of  the  waters  of  the  flood.  (Gen.  7  :  4-10.)  Seven  days 
elapsed  between  the  times  of  sending  forth  the  dove.  (Gen. 
8  :  10-12.)  Are  there  not  here  discernible  indications 
that  this  division  of  time  was  not  incidental  —  that  it  was  a 
settled  one  —  and  observed  according  to  an  original  com- 
mand ?  Seven  days,  or  a  whole  week,  were  devoted  by  Jo- 
seph to  the  mourning  for  his  father.  Job,  also,  and  friends  ob- 
served the  term  of  seven  days  (Job  2  :  13).  Again  :  The  first 
mention  of  the  Sabbath  in  Exodus  occurs  before  the  giving  of 
the  law  (Ex.  16  :  23)  ;  consequently,  the  obligatoriness  of  the 
Sabbath  is  acknowledged,  irrespective  of  the  Mosaic  law  ; 
and  when  alluded  to  there,  mark  how  it  is  done.  Who  can 
help  seeing  that  it  is  spoken  of  as  a  thing  then  already 
known  ? 

The  hebdomadal  method  of  dividing  time,  it  is  worthy  to 
be  observed,  prevailed  even  in  those  heathen  nations  who 
can  be  supposed  to  have  had  no  knowledge  of  the  law  of 
Moses.  And  we  actually  find  that  they  accounted  one  day 
of  the  seven  more  sacred  than  the  rest.  Thus  Heriod  styles 
the  seventh  day,  the  illustrious  light  of  the  sun, 


And  Homer  says, 

E36o[taT7]  6'  tjireiTa  K.arri'kvd  ev  ispov 

"  Then  came  the  seventh  day,  which  is  sacred  or  holy."  All 
the  nations  of  the  East,  indeed,  have  in  all  ages  made  use  of 
this  week  of  seven  days,  for  which  it  is  difficult  to  account 
without  admitting  that  this  knowledge  was  derived  from  the 
common  ancestors  of  the  human  race. 

Without  adding  any  more  in  reference  to  this  question,  we 
trust  you  are  prepared  to  admit  with  us  that  the  blessing  of 
a  Sabbath  was  not  withheld  from  the  primitive  world. 


EVENING   FOURTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN  : 

This  evening's  exercise  we  open  with  a  brief  consideration 
of  a  novel  event,  —  an  event  which  appears  first  to  have 
occurred  soon  after  the  memorable  close  of  the  pilgrimage  of 
Enoch.  This  we  state  in  part  on  the  authority  of  Josephus, 
who  makes  it  to  have  begun  to  take  place  near  the  com- 
mencement of  the  eighth  generation  from  Adam.  The  event 
was  a  matrimonial  alliance  entered  into  between  parties  that 
ought  never  to  have  come  together.  "  The  sons  of  God  "  be- 
gan to  intermarry  with  the  "  daughters  of  men."  (Gen.  6  :  2.) 
Should  you  inquire,  Who  were  these  parties  ?  you  would 
probably  deem  me  not  a  very  competent  instructor  if  I 
should  not  be  able  to  render  an  immediate  and  satisfactory 
answer.  And  yet  even  among  eminent  men  there  has  been 
some  diversity  of  opinion  on  this  point  —  particularly  in  ref- 
erence to  the  first  named,  "the  sons  of  God"  The  Apocry- 
phal Book  of  Enoch,  which  we  have  had  occasion  before  to 
mention,  speaks  of  them  as  angels,  (ch.  7:2).  Josephus 
also  calls  them  angels,  (Ant.  ch.  3,  sec.  1st).  Many  of  the 
Christian  Fathers  of  the  first  three  or  four  centuries,  e.  g. 
Justin  Martyr,  Irenaeus,  Clemens  Alexandrinus,  Tertullian, 
Cyprian,  Lactantius,  and  even  Eusebius,  entertained  a  similar 
opinion.  Coming  down  to  our  own  time,  you  may  perhaps 
be  somewhat  surprised  to  learn  that  Dr.  Kitto  is  disposed  to 
favor  this  view.  (Bib.  111.  vol.  1,  p.  132,) 


WHO    WERE   "THE    SONS   OF    GOD."  57 

If  "  the  sons  of  God  "  be  understood  to  be  angels,  then  the 
phrase,  "  the  daughters  of  men,"  indicates  females  of  Adam's 
progeny,  not  of  any  one  line  definitely  —  but  of  any  line  or 
branch  indifferently,  so  only  they  were  "fair,"  —  or  of 
every  line  promiscuously. 

Now  there  are  in  our  view  some  serious  objections 
against  interpreting  the  phrase,  "  the  sons  of  God,"  after  the 
manner  which  has  been  spoken  of.  The  angels  —  if  these 
be  the  creatures  understood  —  must  of  course  have  assumed 
human  bodies,  since  "  spirits  "  merely,  such  as  are  the  an- 
gels in  their  ordinary  mode  of  being,  (Ps.  104:  4,)  would  be 
illy  prepared  to  take  to  themselves  "  wives  of  the  daughters  of 
men."  And  if  for  this  purpose  they  assumed  human  bodies,  did 
they  assume  them  permanently  ?  If  not,  but,  after  having  ac- 
complished the  mischievous,  nefarious,  lecherous  end  for  which 
they  assumed  them,  put  the  bodies  off,  they  would  be  exceed- 
ingly unfaithful  and  treacherous  husbands.  Good  angels,  sure- 
ly, they  could  not  have  been,  for  these  want  no  wives  of  the 
daughters  of  men.  Quite  too  wise  as  well  as  holy  are  they 
to  desire  any  such  incongruous  alliance.  If  they  did  enter 
into  the  conjugal  relation  at  all,  (which  we  are  assured  they 
do  not,  Mat.  22  :  30,)  they  would  seek,  for  partners,  crea- 
tures considerably  different  from  any  of  the  fallen,  however 
"fair"  of  Adam's  offspring.  In  two  or  three  respects,  we 
may  be  sure,  they  would  be  guilty  of  no  such  conduct  as  is 
attributed  to  the  "  sons  of  God  "  spoken  of  by  Moses  in  the  6th 
of  Genesis.  If  angels  at  all,  they  must  then  have  been  evil 
ones  —  spirits  from  the  pit.  Now  there  is  the  following 
serious  objection  to  this  idea  —  that  though  in  the  Scriptures 
good  angels  are  in  a  few  instances  denominated  "  sons  of 
God,"  yet  evil  angels,  never.  This  thought  also  is  not  un- 
worthy of  mention  :  They  who  understand  "  the  sons  of  God" 
in  the  6th  of  Genesis  to  mean  angels,  understand  the  giants 
spoken  of  in  that  chapter,  to  be  the  product  of  such  strange 
and  incongruous  alliance.  What  an  abnormal  and  wondrous 


58  WHO  WERE  "THE   SONS    OF  GOD." 

sort  of  creatu  res,  then,  must  these  giants  have  been !  what 
marvellous  hybrids  —  semi-diabolic,  semi-human  !  Not  at 
all  amazing  that  a  Flood  should  be  produced  and  hastened 
by  such  a  race  ! 

Some  expositors  attempt  to  arrive  at  the  import  of  the 
phrase  "  sons  of  God  "  by  a  resort  to  the  genius  and  idiom  of 
the  Hebrew.  They  have,  for  example,  observed  a  lofty 
mountain  to  be  called  "  a  mountain  of  God ; "  a  great  rush- 
ing wind,  a  "  wind  of  God ; "  and  kings,  magistrates,  or 
mighty  men,  to  be  sometimes  denominated  "  sons  of  God." 
Hence  they  have  concluded  that  the  phrase  "sons  of  God," 
in  the  place  in  question,  should  be  understood  to  denote  so?is 
of  the  mighty.  They  would  therefore  make  the  passage 
mean,  that  certain  great  or  mighty  ones  among  the  antedilu- 
vians began  to  select  wives  from  among  the  beautiful  daugh- 
ters of  men  of  low  station.  This  interpretation  is  exposed  to 
the  objection  that  it  does  not  appear  to  account  for  the  conse- 
quence which  the  sacred  writer  intimates  to  have  followed 
from  the  kind  of  intermarriage  which  he  had  in  view. 

The  query  then  returns  upon  us,  Who  are  "  the  sons  of 
God "  specified  in  Gen.  6:2?  That  idea,  it  may  be  re- 
plied, which  is  embraced,  we  believe,  by  most  modern  exposi- 
tors, is  probably  much  nearer  the  truth,  —  is  indeed  the 
correct  one,  —  that  they  were  of  the  posterity  of  Seth.  The 
pious  are  God's  regenerated  and  adopted  children  ;  are  de- 
nominated the  "  sons  and  daughters  of  the  Lord  Almighty," 
passim,  in  the  Bible.  Comparatively,  these  Sethites  were  of 
a  pious  race  ;  numbers  of  their  ancestry  were  truly  godly  — 
belonged  to  God  in  covenant.  On  account  of  this  relation- 
ship to  a  pious  ancestry,  and  to  a  greater  or  less  number  of 
contemporaries  who  had  not  openly,  and  some  not  in  heart, 
forsaken  God  ;  —  from  this  cause  rather  than  from  real  moral 
likeness  to  Him  whom  they  should  have  in  a  most  important 
respect  resembled  —  for  there  had  already  been  a  sad  deteri- 
oration among  the  Sethites  —  the  distinctive  appellation  was 


WHO    THE    GIANTS.  59 

still  retained;  the  accustomed  phraseology,  more  strictly 
appropriate  as  applied  to  their  progenitors  than  to  them,  was 
still  used,  —  hence  are,  in  the  passage  of  sacred  history  re- 
ferred to,  denominated  sons  of  God. 

The  "  daughters  of  men  "  are  so  called  in  contradistinction 
from  the  sons  or  daughters  of  God ;  were  of  the  Cainite 
instead  of  Sethite  stock ;  bore  no  intimate  and  endeared  rela- 
tion to  God ;  were  never  transferred  from  their  connection 
with  a  fallen  and  depraved  ancestry,  to  a  gracious  connection 
with  the  Father  of  spirits.  Hebrew,  "  daughters  of  the 
Adam"  not  only  descendants  of  fallen  Adani,  but  retaining 
the  likeness  of  him  as  fallen. 

Do  you  ask,  Who  were  "the  giants  "  of  whom  mention  is 
made  in  Gen.  6:4?  The  original  word  nephilim,  here 
translated  giants,  literally  means  f oilers,  from  naphal,  he  fell. 
Accordingly,  by  eminent  critics  has  the  passage  been  so  inter- 
preted as  to  make  it  speak  merely  of  "  men  of  violence ; 
men  who  beat  down,  oppressed,  and  plundered  the  weak  and 
defenceless."  Aquila  translates  nephilim,,  men  who  attack, 
who  fall  with  impetuosity  on  others.  Simmachus  renders  it 
Eutiot,  violent  men,  cruel,  whose  only  rule  of  action  is  vio- 
lence. The  term  has  no  particular  reference  to  stature. 
The  Septuagint  translates  the  original  word  by  gigantes, 
from  two  words,  signifying  to  be  born  of  the  earth,  or  earth- 
born  ;  a  term  from  which  we  learn  both  the  origin  and  im- 
port of  the  English  word  giant.  It  would  appear  then  that 
from  the  Hebrew  term  here  translated  giants,  we  can  derive 
no  authority  for  attaching  to  the  word  in  our  version  the  idea 
of  vast  stature.  It  is  indeed  not  altogether  improbable  that 
the  men  of  the  Old  World  were  both  in  stature  and  strength 
superior  to  those  of  the  present  day;  an  inference  dedu- 
cible  from  antediluvian  longevity  —  long  life  being  commonly 
the  effect  of  uncommon  constitutional  vigor. 

Arrived  we  now  have,  young  gentlemen,  where  we  may 
begin  to  feel  the  suction  of  the  awful  maelstrom  ;  where  every 


60  INCREASING   DEGENERACY. 

thing  is  to  be  discerned  tending  toward  a  tremendous  cataract 
or  whirlpool  —  so  tremendous  indeed  as  to  threaten  to  shatter 
or  ingulf  every  thing.  One  of  the  most  marked  events,  not 
alone  of  Noah's  time,  but  in  this  world's  history,  are  we  ap- 
proaching ;  —  on  the  confines  we  are  of  two  worlds,  as  the 
accustomed  phraseology  allows  us  to  say,  —  the  end  of  the 
Old  World  and  beginning  of  the  New. 

Drawing  towards  the  close  of  his  fifth  century,  as  to  age, 
is  our  patriarch.  Witnessed  with,  oh,  what  sadness  had  he, 
for  some  time  previous,  the  increasing  degeneracy,  not  only 
of  other  lines  of  the  first  father's  descendants,  but  even  of  the 
best  —  the  Sethites.  In  their  social  and  moral  state  these 
last  had  stood  preeminent.  The  Church  of  the  living  God, 
even,  had  had  from  its  beginning  an  existence  chiefly  among 
them.  There  had  Jehovah  specially  found  a  resting  place, 
and  a  seed  to  serve  him.  Some  of  the  progeny  of  Seth  of 
earlier  times  had  lived  so  near  to  God  as  to  attract  the  world's 
gaze.  One  had  even  been  borne  embodied  as- on  angel-wings 
to  heaven.  But  times  are  now  altered.  The  children  of  this 
choicest  line,  for  the  most  part,  are  not  what  were  their 
fathers.  The  lamp  of  piety  burns  feebly,  emits  but  few  rays. 
The  forms  of  religion  have  been  somewhat  kept  up,  but  the 
life  and  power  of  godliness,  with  mournfully  few  exceptions 
are,  and  for  a  season  past  have  been,  wanting. 

What  a  record  does  the  pen  of  inspiration  now  give  us  of 
the  population  of  the  globe  ?  Hearken :  "  God  saw,"  the  All- 
seeing  eye  saw  —  it  was  such  a  condition  as  specially  to 
attract  the  notice  of  the  Omniscient  and  Infinitely  Holy  One, 
— "  that  the  wickedness  of  man  was  great  in  the  earth." 
But  this  is  not  all !  He  saw  that  "  every  imagination  of  his 
(man's)  heart" — of  man's  —  not  the  heart  of  a  few,  but  of 
the  race  —  "  was  "  —  not  alone  partially—  "  only  evil " ;  —  not 
solely  sometimes,  or  by  turns  —  "  continually"  (Gen.  6  :  5.) 
This  language  is  to  be  understood  intensively.  There  is,  it 
is  true,  no  good  thing,  no  holiness,  in  man  by  nature,  either 


MOURNFUL    CORRUPTION.  61 

as  to  his  state  or  exercises.  But  it  is  not  this  latter  which  is 
intended  to  be  taught  as  a  formal  truth  in  this  place.  There  is 
here  meant  to  be  denoted  a  specialty  as  to  degree  —  a  mar- 
vellous excess,  as  well  as  universality,  of  wickedness.  Lis- 
ten again  to  the  Divine  Testifier  :  —  "  The  earth  was  corrupt 
before  God,  —  all  flesh  had  corrupted  his  way  upon  the 
earth,"  (Gen.  6:  11,  12).  What  a  state  of  moral  degeneracy 
is  here  denoted  !  What  a  one  vast  putrid  mass  spread  before 
the  gaze  of  Infinite  Purity !  If  you  picture  to  yourself  every 
thing  unclean  in  taste  and  feeling,  in  conversation  and  con- 
duct ;  universal  in  extent  and  enormous  in  measure,  as  to 
what  is  here  averred,  you  will  then  have  before  your  mind's 
eye  some  image  of  what  is  denoted  by  the  language  here 
used  by  the  sacred  writer.  The  sin  of  idolatry,  which  is  an 
awfully  corrupt  thing  before  God,  is  one  of  the  items  here  in- 
cluded. The  people's  doing  corruptly,  (2  Chron.  27 :  2,)  is 
explained  in  2  Kings  15  :  35,  by  their  sacrificing  and  burn- 
ing incense  in  the  high  places.  This  flagrant  wickedness, 
(which  was  probably  not  unknown  among  the  Cainites  for 
some  time  ere  this,)  was  perpetrated  "  before  God,"  openly, 
publicly,  without  disguise,  to  his  very  face,  and  every  where. 
There  is  likewise  indicated  an  absence  of  all  personal,  do- 
mestic, and  social  virtue  and  purity,  and  the  abounding  of  the 
opposite  in  thought  and  feeling,  in  speech  and  behavior. 
Every  spring,  fountain,  was  turned  to  filthiness.  Sin  is  an 
unclean  thing  before  God.  Other  forms  of  iniquity  may  be 
considered  as  signified,  —  profanity  or  blasphemy  —  a 
casting  of  contempt  in  word  and  conduct  on  every  thing 
sacred ;  every  elevating  sentiment,  every  ennobling  principle 
set  at  naught,  reviled,  repudiated ;  and  all  that  is  vile  and 
degrading  embraced,  fostered,  encouraged. 

Listen  to  what  the  inspired  annalist  additionally  declares 
concerning  the  condition  of  the  world  at  this  period.  "  The 
earth  was  filled  with  violence,"  (Gen.  6  :  11).  How  mourn- 
fully emphatic  this  language  !  Violence  was  "  the  order  of 

4  s^§^ 


62  UNRESTRAINED    VIOLENCE. 

the  day,"  so  to  spealr.  No  security  to  any  thing  valuable  or 
precious, — to  reputation,  chastity,  property,  personal,  do- 
mestic, social  or  civil  rights ;  or  even  to  life  itself.  Rude, 
defamatory  utterances ;  malicious,  hostile  treatment ;  rapes, 
rapines,  excessive  oppressions  and  cruelties  ;  mobs  ;  noisy  and 
bloody  strifes  ;  wars  ;  murders,  —  these  were  every  where  to 
be  witnessed :  these  filled  the  world.  I  say,  the  world,  for 
mankind  had  greatly  multiplied,  as  Gen.  6:1,  properly  in- 
terpreted, indicates.  The  human  population  had  become 
vastly  numerous  as  well  as  wide-spread.  Cast  your  eye 
again,  young  gentlemen,  on  that  language  we  just  quoted  :  — 
"The  earth"  —  not  some  circumscribed  locality,  or  small 
spots  here  and  there,  solely.  "  Filled  "  —  not  barely  had  a 
little  sprinkling.  With  "  violence  "  —  not  a  little  indulgence 
of  wrong  impulses ;  not  merely  an  inconsiderable  exhibition 
in  the  life  of  dishonest,  covetous,  rapacious,  lewd,  malicious, 
oppressive,  cruel,  murderous  propensity  and  purpose. 

But  was  there  no  government,  no  law,  no  penal  code  ?  you 
will  naturally  inquire.  Amongst  the  Cainites  there  probably 
not  only  was  not,  but  never  had  been  much  of  either.  The 
character  of  their  ancestor,  and  his  example  and  influence, 
would  naturally  lead  to  nothing  very  wholesome  of  this  sort. 
Among  the  Sethites,  and  other  branches  of  Adam's  progeny, 
particular  patriarchal  governments  had  existed  ;  patriarchal 
authority  had,  from  the  beginning  downward,  been  more  or 
less  exercised  and  respected ;  and  as  those  lines  multiplied 
as  to  ramifications  and  numbers,  municipal  regulations,  some 
form  or  forms  of  civil  government,  would  be  called  for  and 
indispensable.  But  as  corruption  increased,  authority  would 
become  more  lax ;  laws  more  lenient,  less  exactive ;  and 
what  laws  were  enacted  would  be  by  degrees  unexecuted. 
What  is  government  or  law  but  the  creature  of  public  senti- 
ment ?  What,  when  enacted,  is  a  wholesome  law  worth,  if 
there  be  not  principle,  virtue,  energy,  or  courage  enough  in 
being  to  enforce  it  ?  At  the  time  we  are  now  speaking  of, 


THIS    STATE    HOW    CAUSED.  63 

there  was  probably  little  of  what  was  worthy  of  the  name  of 
government  or  law  in  existence.  Corruption  had  come  to 
such  a  pitch  —  wickedness  highhanded,  flagitious,  had  ob- 
tained such  an  ascendency  and  prevalence,  —  that  law  and 
order  were  trampled  under  foot ;  wild  anarchy  for  the  most 
part  existed  and  triumphed.  Every  one  did,  we  will  not  say 
what  was  right  in  his  own  eyes,  but  what  he  listed ;  and  from 
the  hints  given  by  the  archaic  historian,  we  see  what  that 
would  be,  —  "  only  evil." 

Desire  you  to  know,  by  what  means,  after  what  manner,  the 
world  before  the  Flood  became  so  enormously  corrupt  ?  — 
the  earth  so  filled  with  violence  ? 

One  prominent  circumstance  leading  to  so  deplorable  a 
state  of  things  amongst  the  antediluvians,  and  which  is  indi- 
cated by  Moses,  was  the  intercourse,  even  to  intermarriage, 
which  was  introduced,  about  the  midlife  of  Noah,  between 
"  the  sons  of  God  "  and  "  the  daughters  of  men," —  in  other 
words,  between  the  Sethites  and  Cainites.  If  we  put  any 
confidence  in  what  Maimonides  has  related,  sometime  since 
quoted  by  us,  concerning  what  occurred  in  the  days  of  Enos ; 
or  if  we  will  compare  Genesis  6  :  5,  with  Rom.  1 :  21,  23  ; 
—  if  we  bring  to  mind  what  St.  Jude  says  about  certain  un- 
godly men  in  his  days,  who,  after  being  represented  as  "  de- 
nying the  only  Lord  God,"  adds,  "  Woe  unto  them,  for  they 
are  gone  in  the  way  of  Gain  (Jude,  verses  4,  11)  ;  and  if  we 
consider  too  what  took  place  so  soon  posterior  to  the  Flood  in 
relation  to  that  sin  —  we  shall  probably  arrive  at  the  conclu- 
sion that  idolatry  began  to  prevail  early,  and  now  prevailed  ex- 
tensively, among  the  wicked  and  accursed  progeny  of  Cain. 
On  those  other  enormous  sins  of  the  Cainites  —  their  infidelity 
and  awful  profligacy  —  the  heinous  sin  of  idolatry  being,  so 
to  speak,  grafted,  —  then;  for  the  posterity  of  Seth,  who  had 
professed  the  true  worship,  to  enter  upon  terms  of  intimacy ; 
to  incorporate  themselves  with  the  Cainite  race ;  to  enter 
even  into  matrimonial  compacts  with  them :  the  sons  of  Seth 


64  THIS    STATE    HOW    CAUSED. 

to  take  to  wife  the  daughters  of  Cain,  joining  with  them  in 
the  most  intimate  of  human  relationships,  —  how  could  this 
fail  to  be  otherwise  than  of  exceedingly  corrupting  and  fatal 
consequence?  To  the  Israelites  God  knew  and  intimated 
what  would  be  the  effect  of  an  alliance  of  this  kind  with  the 
idolatrous  nations,  when  he  said,  (Deut.  7 :  2,  3,)  "  Thou 
shalt  make  no  covenant  with  them  ;  neither  shalt  thou  make 
marriages  with  them  ;  thy  daughter  thou  shalt  not  give  unto 
his  son,  nor  his  daughter  shalt  thou  take  unto  thy  son  :  For 
they  will  turn  away  thy  son  from  following  me,  that  they 
may  serve  other  gods."  This  matter  Balaam  understood 
quite  well,  when,  perceiving  that  every  other  avenue  was 
closed  to  the  effecting  of  the  injury  of  the  children  of  Israel, 
counselled  the  Moabites  to  commence  a  familiarity  with 
them.  And  the  sad  result  we  are  told  :  "  The  people,"  i.  e., 
the  Israelitish  people,  "were  called  unto  the  sacrifices  of 
their  gods  ;  and  the  people  did  eat,  and  bowed  down  to  their 
gods,"  (Numbers  25 :  1,  2.)  Abraham  also  proved  himself 
well  aware  of  this  peril,  when  he  manifested  such  anxiety 
and  uneasiness  lest  his  son  Isaac  should  marry  a  Canaanitish 
woman.  Hence  it  is  likewise  to  be  inferred  that  the  sin  of 
the  Sethites,  after  all  the  light  and  privileges  they  had  en- 
joyed, and  favors  and  blessings  they  had  received  from  God, 
was  very  heinous,  —  to  go  and  mingle  and  intermarry 
with  the  profligate  and  idolatrous  Cainites.  They  could  not 
but  have  foreseen  that  the  consequence  in  all  probability 
would  be  their  seduction  from  the  true  worship  of  Jehovah, 
as  well  as  into  the  paths  of  vice  and  profligacy.  If  tradition 
reports  the  truth,  the  heinousness  of  their  conduct  is  still  far- 
ther enhanced,  being  committed  against  solemn  and  repeated 
warning,  and  in  the  face,  too,  of  an  oath.  The  tradition  ad- 
verted to  purports  that  Adam,  and  Seth,  and  Enos,  each, 
when  dying,  called  the  different  branches  of  his  family 
about  him,  and  gave  them  a  strict  charge  that  they  should 
always  live  separate  from,  and  have  no  manner  of  inter- 


THIS    STATE   HOW   CAUSED.  65 

course  with  the  impious  family  or  descendants  of  the  mur- 
derer Cain ;  and,  moreover,  that  it  was  the  custom  of  the 
Sethites  in  particular,  at  certain  times  to  swear  by  the  blood 
of  Abel  —  which  was  their  solemn  oath  —  that  they  would 
not  run  counter  to  this  charge  or  warning.  Even  thus  early 
—  though  the  principle  had  not  been  wrought  into  a  maxim, 
it  was  a  clear  suggestion  of  reason,  or  a  deduction  from  ob- 
servation or  experience  —  the  idea  was  not  destitute  of  exis- 
tence, that  "  evil  communications  corrupt  good  manners." 

For  some  centuries  the  Cainites  on  the  one  hand,  and  the 
Sethites,  and,  we  may  add,  other  lines  of  our  first  father's 
descendants  on  the  other,  kept  separate,  —  partly  from  a 
regard  among  the  latter  to  the  repeated  monitions  or  charges 
which  they  had  received,  and  the  solemn  oath  taken ;  partly 
from  an  abhorrence  of  idolatry  and  of  other  gross  sins  and 
enormities  of  the  Cainites  ;  as  well  as  because  the  places  of 
their  residence  were  not  contiguous  to  one  another.  Cain  is 
understood  as  having  gone  a  good  way  distant  from  the  other 
branches  —  though  just  how  far  is  not  known.  The  phrase, 
"  land  of  Nod,"  gives  us  no  definite  information  on  this  point. 
Nod  being  the  original  word  for  a  vagabond,  the  land  of  Nod 
means  the  land  of  the  vagrancy  of  the  wretched  outcast.  It 
had  no  name  till  Cain  went  thither.  All  the  geography  that 
Moses  has  afforded  us  concerning  it  is  no  more  than  barely 
that  it  lay  eastward  from  Eden.  As  to  what  distance — at 
how  many  scores  or  centuries  of  leagues  eastward  from  the 
prime  abode  of  the  first  human  pair  —  no  shadow  of  a  hint 
is  given. 

The  rapid  and  vast  multiplication  of  numbers  in  the  two 
lines  of  Cain  and  Seth,  leading  to  a  correspondent  spread  as 
to  location,  brought  portions  of  them  at  length  to  the  inhabit- 
ing of  proximate  territories ;  —  when  young  men  of  the  Seth- 
ite  branch  coming  in  contact  with*  some  of  the  fairer  of  the 
fair  sex  among  the  Outcast's  posterity,  were  so  tempted  by 
their  beauty  that  they  could  not  rest  easy  until  they  had  pro- 


66  THIS    STATE    HOW    CAUSED. 

posed  and  contracted  marriage  with  them.  Had  the  Sethitc 
race  possessed  the  sterling  principles  and  the  abhorrence  of 
wickedness  which  belonged  to  their  ancestors,  no  temptation  of 
this  sort  could  have  been  strong  enough  to  overcome  them ;  but, 
as  we  hinted  before,  there  had  occurred  already  a  melancholy 
decline.  The  influence  which  this  conjugal  union  exerted 
upon  the  husbands  was  very  baleful ;  but  the  effect  of  it  upon 
their  progeny  still  more  so.  What  can  be  expected  of  chil- 
dren, having  such  mothers,  but  the  worst  type  of  character  and 
conduct  ?  Vastly  more  is  the  moulding  of  character,  the 
shaping  of  the  sentiments  and  the  life,  in  the  power  of  moth- 
ers than  of  fathers.  Unprincipled,  abandoned,  idolatrous, 
excessively  wicked  Cainite  mothers  !  —  what  the  results  upon 
the  rising  race,  but  of  a  kind  the  most  lamentable  and  evil  ? 
Moreover,  what  a  mischievous  and  corrupting  influence 
would  such  a  posterity  diffuse  all  around  them ! 

But  although  this  alone  is  particularly  specified  by  the 
sacred  writer,  there  were  yet  other  causes  at  work  to  produce 
that  universal  and  excessive  degeneracy  and  wickedness 
which  he  mentions.  The  great  length  of  life  to  which  the 
unregenerate  antediluvian  population  attained,  doubtless  was 
the  occasion  of  contributing  not  an  inconsiderable  share. 
What,  in  any  age,  and  under  any  circumstances,  is  to  be 
looked  for  from  unsanctified  human  nature  but  gradual  dete- 
rioration,—  without  special  gracious  influence,  a  progress 
from  bad  to  worse  ?  The  principles  belonging  to  the  unre- 
newed  human  heart  not  only  grow  and  strengthen  with 
increasing  years,  but  impel  the  possessor  onward  in  a  de- 
scending or  receding  course  ;  the  distance,  whatever  may  to 
the  casual  or  superficial  observer  be  the  appearance,  is  con- 
stantly widening  between  him  and  God,  and  so  between  him 
and  all  that  enters  into  true  moral  excellence  and  goodness. 
A  life  continued  through  half  a  score  of  centuries  appears  so 
wellnigh  changeless  and  interminable  ;  is  adapted  to  occasion 
such  an  absence  of  fear  in  regard  to  death's  attack,  and  of 


THIS    STATE    HOW    CAUSED.  67 

apprehension  respecting  judgment's  doom,  as  to  rid  the 
wicked  of  wholesome  and  needful  restraints  ;  as  naturally  to 
embolden  them  in  a  course  of  unrepentant  ungodliness  ;  to 
produce  increasing  recklessness  and  fearful  and  approximat- 
ingly  incorrigible  obduracy ;  to  make  them  of  gigantic  effi- 
ciency in  the  ranks  and  cause  of  the  Adversary ;  to  prolong, 
enlarge,  and  widen  their  injurious  and  ruinous  influence  over 
the  younger  portions  of  the  race,  not  only  those  to  whom 
they  are  more  especially  related,  but  those  far  greater  num- 
bers with  whom  they  may  more  or  less  come  in  contact. 

We  may  likewise  in  part  account  for  the  deplorably  sunken 
and  awfully  corrupt  condition  of  the  human  race,  at  this 
period,  from  still  another  cause  ;  and  that  is,  there  was  then 
in  existence  among  the  inhabitants  of  the  globe  but  one  lan- 
guage, —  and  so  no  obstruction,  as  to  this  particular,  pre- 
sented to  the  most  general  as  well  as  intimate  intercourse. 
Had  the  state  of  public  sentiment  or  the  general  tone  of  mor- 
als been  good,  such  facilities  for  intercourse  as  would  be 
afforded  by  the  universal  prevalence  among  the  family  of 
man  of  one  and  the  same  language,  would  have  been,  and  in 
a  high  degree,  not  only  intellectually,  but  morally  beneficial. 
But  owing  to  the  fact  that  even  in  the  best  preceding  periods, 
notwithstanding  all  that  grace  had  done,  the  majority  were 
wicked ;  that  for  a  while  before  the  period  of  which  we 
speak,  nearly  the  whole  of  mankind  were  so,  and  a  consider- 
able proportion  very  wicked,  —  this  facility  for  free,  unob- 
structed and  general  intercourse  was  attended  with  its  evils  ; 
facilitated  the  dissemination  of  the  various  phases  and  forms 
of  vice  and  crime,  as  well  as  deepened  the  hue  of  everywhere 
abounding  iniquity. 

Let  it  be  additionally  considered,  that  this  universal  preva- 
lence of  one  language  would,  along  with  other  existing  cir- 
cumstances, naturally  lead  to  what  has  been  very  commonly 
regarded  as  a  fact,  that  the  antediluvian  population,  large, 
multitudinous  as  it  had  become,  was  more  dense  in  proportion 


68  THE   DIVINE   DISPLEASURE    EXCITED. 

to  the  whole  number,  i.  e.,  were,  wherever  communities  were 
settled,  crowded  more  compactly,  than  any  postdiluvian 
period,  even  up  to  our  day,  has  witnessed :  the  conse- 
quence of  which  would  be,  the  more  easy  and  rapid  spread  of 
corruption  and  hydra-headed  iniquity. 

Such  a  direful,  dreadful  state  of  moral  pollution,  vice,  vio- 
lence —  so  extreme  in  degree,  and  so  uncircumscribed,  ex- 
tending, raging,  every  where  ~  could  not  but  be  inconceivably 
offensive  to  that  Being  Supreme  who  is  "of  purer  eyes 
than  to  behold  evil,  and  cannot  look  on  iniquity ; "  and  ex- 
ceedingly the  more  so  from  the  fact  that  the  family  of  man, 
in  all  its  branches,  had  not,  from  the  Fall  downward,  been 
the  objects  of  entire  judicial  abandonment  on  the  part  of  the 
Deity;  but  had,  if  we  except  the  accursed  race  of  Cain, 
been  very  kindly  and  graciously  dealt  with ;  had,  through 
various  media,  in  numerous  ways,  been  afforded  means  and 
facilities  for  forming  an  acquaintance  both  with  truth  and 
duty.  In  his  abounding  benevolence,  God  had  set  pious 
fathers  and  mothers  and  more  remote  progenitors  and  relatives 
to  imparting  instruction,  counsel,  admonition,  and  warning ; 
had  in  a  direct  manner,  from  time  to  time,  spoken  to  them 
preceptively  and  tuitionally ;  had  imparted  to  them,  and  that 
too,  very  early,  precious  gospel  intimations,  as  in  the  PROMISE 
and  the  SACRIFICE  ;  had  made  communications  through  Vis- 
ions, and  Voices,  and  Dreams,  and  Angelic  Ministries ;  had 
prophesied  to  them  through  Enoch,  and  enlightened  them  as 
to  a  future  and  immortal  life  —  immortal  life  for  the  whole 
man  —  through  the  marvellous  translation  of  the  last  named ; 
and,  for  a  while  past,  moreover  had  preached  to  them  by  our 
patriarch  (2  Pet.  2  :  5.)  Considering  all  these  things,  and, 
perhaps  we  might  safely  say,  a  good  deal  besides  which  tjie 
brief  antediluvian  record  does  not  include  —  superadded 
to  nature's  utterances; — taking  into  account  all  these  — 
that  antediluvian  population  should  have  been  a  holy,  God- 
fearing, and  God-serving  people,  surely,  instead  of  what,  at 


"THE  LORD  REPENTED"  —  ITS  MEANING.  G9 

the  season  of  which  we  are  speaking,  they  are  represented 
by  the  archaic  writer  to  have  been. 

So  desperate,  on  the  contrary,  in  despite  of  these  things, 
had  become  the  character  and  conduct  of  the  human  family, 
as  to  fall  short  utterly  of  the  great  end  for  which  they  had 
been  brought  into  being ;  and  thus  in  the  strong  and  strange 
sounding  language  of  the  historian,  "  it  repented  the  Lord 
that  he  had  made  man  on  the  earth,  and  it  grieved  him  at 
his  heart,"  (Gen.  6 :  6.) 

Perplexed,  no  doubt,  have  some  minds  been  at  this  form  of 
expression.  Difficulty  have  they  encountered  in  arriving  at 
a  comprehension  of  its  import,  or  in  reconciling  it  with  what 
they  have  conceived  the  Infinite  Divinity  to  be.  It  seems 
to  impinge  one  or  more  of  his  attributes  ;  to  indicate,  at  the 
least,  that  the  Supreme  Being  had  been  sorely  disappointed 
in  regard  to  man  ;  that  the  latter  had  not  deported  himself 
as  the  former,  when  he  made  him,  had  expected  that  he 
would.  And  is  God  then  not  omniscient  ?  Did  he  not  know 
the  end  from  the  beginning?  Spread  out  before  his  vast, 
illimitable  mind,  were  not  absolutely  all  phases  of  being,  con- 
dition, character,  conduct  ?  Known  unto  him  from  everlasting 
were  not  all  things  that  ever  have  been  and  ever  shall  be  ? 

Let  it  be  remarked  of  that  language  quoted  which  has 
given  rise  to  such  perplexity,  that  it  presents  one  of  the  many 
instances  of  the  anthropopathia ;  a  mode  of  expression 
adapted  by  the  graciousness  of  Divine  condescension  to  the 
fmiteness  of  human  capacity,  —  particularly  to  that  stage  of 
culture  which  has  not  the  mastery  of  abstract  phraseology ; 
a  condescension  which  kindly  stoops  to  convey  spiritual  sen- 
timents in  language  borrowed  from  sensible  and  familiar 
objects,  and  from  the  well  understood  passions  and  emotions 
of  men.  Disappointment  and  sorrow  are  indeed  not  properly 
predicable  of  the  All-knowing  and  Infinitely  happy  God.  All 
the  ingredients  which  enter  into  man's  repentance,  then,  do 
not  enter  into  that  which  is  predicated  of  the  Lord.  But, 
4* 


70  "THE  LORD  REPENTED"  —  ITS  MEANING. 

when  man  repents,  he  changes  his  course  —  acts  differently 
from  what  he  did  before.  A  father  is  sorry  that  he  has  ex- 
pended so  much  money  in  the  education  of  his  wayward  and 
profligate  son,  and  so  determines  that  he  will  expend  upon 
him  no  more.  An  artisan  constructs  a  machine  or  instrument 
which  does  not  answer  the  end  that  he  designed  or  thought 
he  might  reasonably  expect  from  it ;  it  is  useless ;  it  is 
an  incumbrance ;  and  so  he,  instead  of  taking  pains  to 
preserve,  destroys  it.  Now  it  is  this  latter  that  is  imported 
when  the  word  "  repent "  is  used  in  reference  to  Jehovah. 
Mankind  had  not  answered  the  great  end  for  which  they  were 
made ;  had  not  deported  themselves  as  the  Lord  had  a  right 
to  expect ;  and  his  providential  kindness  and  care  he  deter- 
mines shall  not  be  exercised  toward  them  as  formerly.  He 
will  alter  his  dispensations  ;  will  change  his  course ;  deal 
differently  toward  them  from  what  he  had  done.  The  idea 
of  disapprobation  enters  into  repentance  in  man's  case ;  and 
so  it  does,  though  in  a  different  relation,  into  the  repentence 
which  the  Scriptures  affirm  of  God :  disapprobation  of  the 
thing  as  it  is.  You  have  the  idea.  Your  patience  will  not 
be  further  taxed,  this  evening. 


EVENING    FIFTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN  : 

Such  deep  and  universal  corruption  as  that  to  which  we 
had  our  attention  directed  in  the  last  exercise,  the  sovereign 
Lord  of  all  resolves  shall  not  be  perpetuated ;  such  a  raging 
torrent  of  horrible  wickedness  and  diabolical  violence  he  de- 
termines shall  not  flow  down  in  unbroken,  uninterrupted  suc- 
cession, to  unborn  generations,  one  after  another,  for  all 
coming  time.  He  prefers  that  the  future  generations  of  his 
human  creatures  should  not  be  the  offspring  of  those  who  had 
become  so  contaminated  by  iniquity  and  so  demonized  in  vio- 
lence ;  and  whose  reproductions  would  have  thereby  been 
injurious  to  themselves  and  to  human  nature.  He  is  exceed- 
ingly unwilling  that  such  vices  and  crimes  as  had  become 
general  should  be  continued  as  the  settled  character  and 
habit  of  the  human  order  of  being.  His  benevolence  moved 
him  to  the  adoption  of  a  course  which  would  be  followed 
with  the  attainment  of  the  greatest  aggregate  of  good.  If, 
by  utterly  destroying  a  generation  so  depraved  and  mis- 
chievous as  the  one  then  existing,  all  succeeding  generations 
down  to  the  last  gasp  of  time  would  receive  vast  benefit, 
could  the  infinitely  good  Ruler  over  all  fail  to  do  the  thing  ? 
particularly  when  justice,  instead  of  remonstrating  against, 
would  urgently,  eloquently,  plead  for  it.  He  to  whom  be- 
longeth  dominion  was  so  wise  as  well  as  benevolent  as  greatly 


72  THE   DIVINE    RESOLVE. 

to  prefer  a  new  production  of  mankind  from  a  particular  and 
single  stem,  selected  out  of  the  preexisting  society  for  that 
purpose,  than  to  continue  the  corrupt  and  corrupting  mass 
that  was  then  encumbering  and  cursing  the  earth. 

Besides,  Jehovah  has  a  character  as  moral  governor  to 
sustain  before  all  the  holy  of  the  universe  ;  to  vindicate  from 
all  imputation,  and  defend  from  all  suspicion.  God  is  infi- 
nitely holy  ;  hates  sin  with  a  perfect  hatred ;  and  he  is  deter- 
mined to  throw  forth  such  a  manifestation  of  his  abhorrence 
of  it  as  would  not  be  forgotten  in  all  coming  time.  He  is  a 
just  God,  and  he  will  not  continue  to  treat  so  leniently  a  race 
so  sunk  in  sin,  so  desperate  and  diabolical  in  habit,  so  polluted 
and  blood-reddened  with  crime,  as  to  allow  occasion  for  any 
of  his  creatures,  in  any  age  to  come,  to  infer  that  justice  is 
not  an  attribute  of  his  nature  —  that  righteousness  belongeth 
not  to  Him.  No,  no ;  He  will  not  so  lose  sight  of  his  own 
glory.  Though  benevolence,  and  patience,  and  mercy  are 
not  absent  from  his  heart,  he  will,  he  is  determined  to  inter- 
rupt the  flow  of  the  dark  tide.  By  one  tremendous  display 
of  his  power  he  will  sweep  the  putrid  and  putrifying  mass 
from  the  globe.  He  tells  Noah,  so  peculiar  a  man  is  he  —  so 
different  from  the  rest  —  one  whom  the  historian  in  words  of 
emphasis  says  had  u  found  grace  in  his  sight  "  —  God  lets 
this  man  know  what  his  determination  is.  His  Spirit,  through 
the  media  and  means  we  a  while  since  specified,  had  labored 
to  restrain,  circumscribe,  lessen,  annihilate,  the  abounding  ini- 
quity :  to  lead  men  to  a  sense  of  duty,  and  to  a  regard  to  what 
was  honest,  kind,  lovely,  and  of  good  report ;  to  recognize 
their  solemn  responsibilities  and  their  true  interests ;  but  in 
vain.  The  obdurate,  infatuate,  and  infuriate  race  grieved 
and  vexed  that  Spirit ;  resisted  and  spurned  his  influences  ; 
"  set  at  naught  his  counsel,  and  would  none  of  his  reproof." 

"And  the  Lord  said,"  i.  e.,  to  himself:  "  I  will  destroy  man 
whom  I  have  created  from  the  face  of  the  earth ;  both  man, 
and  beast,  and  creeping  thing,  and  the  fowls  of  the  air," 


THE    COMMAND     GIVEN    TO    NOAII.  7o 

| 

_ 

(Gen.  6:7;)  and  this  purpose  he  states  to  Noah  in  a  succeed--/ 
ing  verse  (v.  13th).  He  then  proceeds  (verses  14-16)  to 
command  our  patriarch  to  build  an  ark,  particularizing  the 
form  and  dimensions;  and,  in  the  verse  following,  (17th,)  he 
declares  the  means  by  which  his  determination  shall  be  exe- 
cuted, viz.,  by  "  a  flood  of  waters"  But  why,  some  might  be 
disposed  to  exclaim  —  why  should  the  beast,  and  creeping 
thing,  and  fowls  of  the  air  partake  in  the  destruction  ? 
Why  must  they  be  involved  in  the  ruin,  since  they  had  no 
participation  in  the  sin  ?  The  response  which  we  are  dis- 
posed to  give  to  this  is,  that  the  animal  tribes  being  made  for 
man's  use  and  as  a  kind  of  appendage  to  him,  they  hence  are 
involved  in  his  calamities.  Man's  sin  brings  ruin  upon  his 
comforts  as  well  as  upon  himself.  Besides,  God  is  the  origi- 
nal and  prime  proprietor  of  all  things,  and  may  do  what  he 
will  with  his  own.  Situated,  moreover,  as  the  animal  tribes 
here  are,  and  having  no  immortal  part  to  fit  for  a  felicitous 
future,  a  cessation  of  existence  can  be  to  them  no  great  evil. 
And  does  the  Lord  hasten  to  the  execution  of  his  solemn 
and  tremendous  purpose  ?  No.  The  vessel  itself  which  our 
patriarch  was  enjoined  to  make,  could  not  be  built  in  a  day. 
Not  only  was  it  to  be  a  vast  structure,  but  of  so  many  com- 
partments, and  contrivances,  and  conveniences,  and  so  thor- 
oughly constructed  for  safety,  and  with  a  view  to  the  answer- 
ing of  the  ends  in  full  of  its  construction,  as  necessarily  to 
require  no  little  time  to  complete  it.  Even  to  provide  the 
materials  would  consume  a  considerable  season.  But  besides 
this,  God  has  an  attribute  of  mercy  as  well  as  of  justice  ;  he 
is  long  suffering  and  pitiful  as  well  as  holy  and  righteous. 
Notwithstanding  the  superfluity  of  naughtiness  and  the  deluge 
of  sin  everywhere  prevalent,  and  constituting  a  deep,  dark 
flood  —  he  holds  back  the  deluge  of  water ;  stays  the  over- 
flowing and  angry  flood  —  and  for  no  less  a  period  than  one 
hundred  and  twenty  years,  (Gen.  6:  3.)  And  here  we 


74  CHILDREN     OF     THE     PATRIARCH. 

ought  not  to  fail  to  notice  the  incidental  corroboration  af- 
forded by  this  circumstance,  to  the  duration,  ascribed  by  the 
record,  to  human  life  before  the  flood.  Dr.  Kitto  has  called 
the  attention  of  his  readers  to  this  point  in  his  Biblical 
Illustrations,  vol.  1,  p.  138  :  "A  hundred  and  twenty  years," 
says  he,  "  would  have  been  too  long,  according  to  the  present 
duration  of  life ;  for  many  who  were  not  born  when  the 
judgment  was  first  denounced  would  have  died  before  it  was 
accomplished ;  and  so  long  a  delay  of  judgment  would  have 
weakened  the  force  of  the  denunciation,  and  would  have  al- 
lowed most  people  to  view  it  as  a  thing  not  to  happen  in 
their  time,  and  which  therefore  they  would  but  lightly  re- 
gard. But  one  hundred  and  twenty  years  was  less  than  the 
eighth  of  the  average  duration  of  antediluvian  life ;  and,  in 
respect  of  warning,  was  not  more  to  that  generation  than  nine 
years  would  be  to  us.  It  was  therefore  an  interval  just  long 
enough  for  effective  warning,  without  being  so  long  as  to 
allow  any  man  that  lived,  to  deem  that  he  might  neglect  that 
warning  without  danger." 

From  twenty  to  twenty-six  or  thirty  years  subsequently  to 
the  first  intimations  received  by  our  patriarch  concerning  the 
Divine  intentions  to  destroy  the  population  of  the  earth  for 
their  wickedness,  there  were  born  unto  him  the  three  sons, 
Shem,  Ham,  and  Japheth.  At  the  birth  of  the  elder  of  these 
Noah  was  in  his  500th  year,  (Gen.  5  :  32  and  6 :  10.)  Though 
no  mention  is  made  of  it  in  the  extremely  brief  archaic  record, 
it  would  nevertheless  be  unreasonable  to  suppose  that  our 
patriarch  had  had  no  children  born  unto  him  anterior  to  this 
period  of  his  life.  Judging  from  the  time  that  the  other 
antediluvian  patriarchs,  according  to  the  specifications  of  the 
historian  in  the  previous  part  of  the  fifth  chapter,  had  become 
parents,  we  might  infer  that  Noah's  children,  previously  born, 
had  amounted  to  a  large  number,  —  but,  under  the  pernicious 
influences  of  their  time,  having  gone  in  the  way  of  Cain ; 


ORDER   OP   THE    BIRTH    OF   THE    THREE    SONS.  7.) 

become  undistinguishable  from  the  multitudes  of  the  incorri- 
gibly ungodly ;  the  memory  of  them  was  not  retained  — 
was  left  to  rot.  These  shared  the  fate  of  the  millions  whose 
example  they  had  imitated.  If  Noah  had  had  them  wholly 
under  his  own  paternal  and  wholesome  influence  they  doubt- 
less would  have  formed  a  different  character,  and  come  to  a 
different  end  :  For  he  probably  was  pious  ere  he  became  a 
parent;  even,  as  has  been  previously  intimated  by  us,  in 
quite  early  life.  But  he  would  have  been  obliged  to  withdraw 
or  withhold  them  from  all  but  strictly  domestic  association  in 
order  to  a  successful  preserving  of  them  from  danger  of  con- 
tamination from  a  corrupt  and  ungodly  world  ;  and  our  patri- 
arch had  not  early  experience,  or  observation,  or  rigor  enough 
to  adopt  so  restrictive  a  course  with  his  earlier  children.  As 
the  three  whose  names  are  mentioned  were  born  posterior  to 
the  intimations  he  had  received  relative  to  God's  purpose  to 
destroy  mankind  for  their  iniquities,  he  would  naturally  be 
led  to  the  adoption  of  a  faithful  and  effective  restraining 
regimen  in  reference  to  them. 

Of  the  three  sons  of  our  patriarch  whose  names  are  given 
in  the  record,  though  Shem  is  the  first  in  order  as  to  the 
mention,  yet  Japheth  was  the  elder,  as  you  may  perceive  by 
looking  at  Gen.  10  :  21 ;  and  this  seems  inferable  from  1 
Chron.  1 :  5,  &c.,  his  descendants  being  first  given  in  the 
genealogical  roll  there  found.  Shem  was  next  in  age  to 
Japheth,  for  we  learn  from  Gen.  9  :  24,  that  Ham  was  the 
youngest.  "We  are  aware  that  some  have  thought  Ham  to 
have  been  the  second  of  the  three,  because  he  is  almost 
invariably  mentioned  between  the  other  two ;  but  this  argu- 
ment, derived  from  order  of  mention,  is  of  no  weight  against 
positive  testimony ;  and  if  such  an  argument  were  decisive 
in  this  case,  it  would  settle  it  as  a  fact  that  Japheth  was 
younger  than  Ham,  since  his  name  usually  comes  last  in  the 
record.  Their  father  being  in  his  500th  year  when  the  eldest 


76  AMOUNT    OF    ANTEDILUVIAN    POPULATION. 

of  the  three  was  bora,  (Gen.  5  :  32  ;)  and  in  his  600th  year* 
when  he  entered  the  ark,  (Gen.  7 :  11 ;)  and,  two  years  after 
the  flood,  Shem,  at  the  birth  of  Arphaxad,  being  100  years 
of  age,  (Gen.  11 :  10,)  and  so  98  when  the  flood  came 
on,  you  perceive  that  Japheth  must  have  been  two  years  the 
senior  of  Shem.  And,  if  there  was  the  same  difference  in 
age  between  Shem  and  Ham  the  younger,  then  Noah  was  in 
his  504th  year  at  the  birth  of  this  last,  and  Ham  in  his  96th 
year  at  the  commencement  of  the  Deluge. 

Should  it  be  inquired  why  Shem,  though  not  the  oldest,  is 
always  first  named  by  the  historian,  it  might  be  answered, 
because  the  genealogies  and  the  chronology  are  kept  up  in 
his  line ;  and  the  principal  parts  of  the  sacred  history  relate  to 
his  descendants.  And  though  Ham  was  the  youngest,  yet  he  is 
always  named  next,  because  the  sacred  history  has  more  to  do 
with  his  descendants  than  with  those  of  Japheth  —  we  mean 
so  far  as  circumstantial  detail  is  concerned. 

From  what  has  been  observed  respecting  the  age  of  Noah 
when  his  three  sons,  Shem,  Ham,  and  Japheth  were  born, 
along  with  the  fact  of  there  being  the  interval  of  but  two 
years  between  the  birth  of  Japheth  and  Shem,  and  probably 
(reasoning  from  analogy)  between  the  latter  and  Ham,  may 
we  not  derive  suggestive  aid  in  arriving  at  some  correct 
idea  concerning  the  numbers  to  which  the  human  popula- 
tion amounted  anterior  to  the  Deluge  ?  If  Noah  and  other 
autediluvians  began  to  sustain  the  parental  relation,  severally, 

*Noah  is  indeed,  in  Gen.  7  :  6,  said  to  have  been  600  years  old  when  the 
flood  of  waters  was  upon  the  earth  ;  but  this  expression  is  afterward  ex- 
plained that  it  was  in  the  600th  year  of  his  age,  (see  1 1th  verse).  "  Annus 
inchoatus  pro  perfecto  habetur."  A  distinguished  Jewish  author  lays  it 
down  as  a  rule  to  be  observed,  that  part  of  the  month  or  year  is  as  the 
whole.  This  is  so  in  regard  to  day  also,  as  is  evident  in  the  case  of  our  Sa- 
viour's resurrection.  Dr.  A.  Clarke,  remarking  on  the  clause  in  the  llth 
verse,  "  in  the  600th  year  of  Noah's  life,"  says,  "  This  must  have  been  in 
the  beginning  of  the  600th  year  of  his  life,  for  he  was  a  year  in  the  ark, 
(oh.  8  :  13,)  and  died  950  years  old,  (ch.  9  :  29.)  It  is  thus  evident  that 
when  the  flood  commenced  he  had  just  entered  on  his  600th  year. 


AMOUNT    OP  ANTEDILUVIAN     POPULATION.  77 

we  will  not  say  at  20  or  30  years  old,  but  at  the  age  of  80  or 
100,  and  continued  having  children  born  to  them  up  to  the 
age  of  500  and  over,  as  is  revealed  as  the  case  with  father 
Noah ;  and  if  the  interval,  as  to  births,  was  on  an  average 
not  much  if  any  more  than  that  between  the  birth  of  Japheth 
and  Shem,  i.  e.,  two  years,  then  the  population  of  the  globe 
prior  to  the  deluge,  making  all  reasonable  allowance  (from 
every  cause  or  circumstance)  for  death's  doings,  could  not 
have  been  small ;  must  have  become  very  numerous.  During 
the  last  two  hundred  years  of  the  Old  World  we  may,  it  is 
true,  believe  that  the  increase  would  not  be  proportionate  to 
what  it  had  been  for  a  similar  period  preceding,  (though  the 
regular  increase  should  have  been  much  greater,)  because 
"  violence  was  then  great  in  the  earth,"  hurrying  thousands, 
yea,  probably  millions  to  an  untimely  end.  Yet,  taking  even 
this  noteworthy  circumstance  into  the  account,  the  inhabitants 
of  this  planet  must  have  become  immensely  numerous.  Not 
alone  from  the  great  number  of  children  which  antediluvian 
parental  pairs  would  have  born  to  them,  let  it  be  observed, 
would  the  population  become  great;  but  from  the  circum- 
stance, moreover,  of  many  generations  flourishing  in  a  meas- 
ure simultaneously,  occupying  the  earth  for  a  greater  or  less 
period  together,  as  a  consequence  of  prevalent  longevity. 
Without  a  resort  to  any  extravagant  tabular  computations, 
such  as  Winston's,  for  example,  (see  Rees's  Cyclopedia,  Art. 
Antediluvians,)  we  might  be  justly  charged  with  acting  irra- 
tionally, did  we  set  narrow  limits  to  the  number  of  inhabit- 
ants of  the  Old  World,  for  centuries  before  the  flood  came  on. 

Japheth,  Shem,  and  Ham  were  severally  married  previous 
to  the  Deluge,  (Gen.  7  :  13  ;)  yet  they  either  had  no  children 
antecedently,  or  these  did  not  live ;  since  they  carried  none1 
with  them  into  the  ark.  Eight  of  human  kind  alone  found 
refuge  there,  (1  Pet.  3  :  20). 

If  you  have  any  desire  to  become  wise  above  what  is  writ- 
ten in  regard  to  the  names  borne  by  Noah's  wife  and  the 


78  A    STRANGE     CONCEIT. 

wives  of  his  three  sons,  look  into  Bedford's  Scripture  Chro- 
nology, pages  140,  141,  where  you  may  read,  "  The  Oriental 
writers  call  the  wife  of  Noah  by  several  names,  as  Titsiah, 
Naamah,  and  Aritsiah ;  this  last  meaning  earthly,  because 
like  the  earth  she  was  the  mother  of  all  living.  Another 
writer  is  so  positive  as  to  say  that  the  name  of  Noah's  wife 
was  Haical,  the  daughter  of  Narausa,  the  son  of  Enoch ;  and 
that  his  three  sons  took  them  wives  of  the  daughters  of  Me- 
thuselah, and  that  the  name  of  Shem's  wife  was  Salit ;  the 
name  of  Ham's  wife  Nahlat ;  and  the  name  of  Japheth's  wife 
Arisisah.  It  is  probable,"  continues  Bedford,  "  that  the  wives 
of  Noah,  Shem,  and  Japheth,  were  of  the  posterity  of  Seth, 
and  that  none  of  these  married  into  the  race  of  Cain,  because 
they  were  esteemed  to  be  men  of  piety  and  virtue,  and  there- 
fore most  likely  to  observe  the  command,  which  seems  to  be 
handed  down  from  their  ancestors,  that  they  should  not  marry 
into  strange  families.  As  for  Ham,  his  character  was  differ- 
ent from  the  rest,  and  therefore  a  curse  was  entailed  on  his 
posterity  for  his  immoralities.  So  that  since  Plutarch  tells 
us  that  some  called  the  wife  of  Ham,  Namaus,  it  is  easy  to 
conjecture  that  she  was  Naamah,  the  daughter  of  Lamech, 
sister  of  Tubal-cain  of  the  race  of  Cain,  the  last  person 
mentioned  in  that  line,  and  the  only  woman  before  the  flood 
of  whose  birth  Moses  takes  any  notice."  We  cannot  omit  to 
say,  young  gentlemen,  that  this  last  conjecture,  though  curi- 
ous, is  certainly  very  incredible.  Naamah,  the  daughter  of 
the  Cainite  Lamech,  was  probably  born  too  long  before  Hani 
to  become  his  wife,  inasmuch  as  her  father,  as  was  on  a  former 
occasion  intimated,  was,  like  the  Sethite  Enoch,  of  the  seventh 
generation  from  Adam,  and  may  consequently  be  inferred  to 
have  been  contemporary  with  him.  If  Ham  was  rendered  a 
worse  man  than  he  otherwise  would  have  been,  through  the  in- 
fluence of  a  wicked  wife,  he  needed  not  to  go  among  the  Cain- 
ites  to  find  one  of  that  character;  for  just  before  the  flood  the 
women  of  the  Sethite  line,  even,  as  well  as  of  the  multitudinous 


CHARACTERISTICS    OF   THE   PATRIARCH.  79 

other  lines,  had  been  involved  in  and  been  carried  away  by 
the  generally  raging  tide  of  corruption. 

Scarcely  has  a  hint  yet  been  dropped  concerning  the  char- 
acter of  our  patriarch.  The  period  of  one  hundred  and  twenty 
years,  intervening  between  the  first  intimations  received  by  him 
respecting  the  divinely  intended  submergence  of  the  world  with 
its  multitudinous  and  guilty  population,  and  the  actual  occur- 
rence of  the  threatened  punitive  event,  afforded  occasion,  as 
you  all  cannot  but  perceive,  for  the  exhibition  of  prominent 
leading  traits,  mental,  moral,  and  religious,  in  the  man  whose 
history  we  are  particularly  considering.  To  continue  godly,  un- 
unswervingly,  unflinchingly  godly,  whilst  in  its  various,  almost 
countless  forms,  ungodliness  was  every  where  prevalent  and 
popular  not  only,  but  guileful,  unscrupulous,  bold,  unblushing, 
malignant,  persecuting,  and  untiringly  active,  required  a  large 
amount  of  mental  strength,  and  of  firmness  and  resolution  in 
favor  of  truth  and  righteousness.  Noah  was  firm  —  immova- 
ble as  a  rock.  He  fully  and  uninterruptedly  maintained  his 
integrity  as  a  friend  and  servant  of  God.  Naught  in  the 
form  of  allurement  could  draw,  or  of  menace  and  terror 
drive  him  from  a  strict  and  becomingly  rigid  adherence  to  the 
principles  which  have  the  approval  of  Heaven.  No  pusil- 
lanimous shrinking  !  Earth  and  hell  seemed  leagued  against 
him ;  but  their  arts  and  power  were  insufficient  to  weaken  or 
mar  his  fidelity  to  the  Infinite  King.  Ridicule,  mockery, 
scoffing,  derision,  reproach,  menace ;  whatever  malevolence 
or  cunning  could  suggest,  or  deep  and  multiform  depravity 
invent  —  these  were  tried  upon  him,  repeatedly,  protractedly 
—  but  wholly  in  vain.  The  same  man  of  God  was  he  still ; 
or  rather  did  he  become  more  and  more  the  giant  in  vigor, 
and  the  rock  in  firmness.  Familiarity  with  the  sight  of  vice 
and  wickedness,  which  has  ordinarily  such  a  tendency  to 
relax  the  muscles  and  weaken  the  nerves  of  virtue,  appeared 
to  have  the  diametrically  opposite  effect  upon  him.  The 
more  he  witnessed  of  iniquity,  the  greater  became  his  detes- 
tation of  it,  and  to  it  did  he  oppose  a  bolder,  firmer  front. 


80  CHARACTERISTICS   OF    THE    PATRIARCH. 

He  was  eminently  a  patient  man.  If  ever  human  creature 
was,  this  man  you  must  acknowledge  to  have  been  deeply 
tried.  With  much  had  he  to  meet  which  is  grievous  to  flesh 
and  blood.  From  what  we  have  just  been  declaring  in  rela- 
tion to  what  was  brought  to  bear  against  him,  it  is  manifest 
that  something  more  than  his  integrity  or  loyalty  was  sub- 
jected to  trial.  His  patience  also  was  put  to  the  test.  He 
bore  his  troubles  well ;  we  say  not  "  like  a  man ; "  rather 
might  we  in  truth  say,  like  something  more  than  man.  Re- 
taliation, revenge,  spite,  complaint  —  not  a  word  do  we  hear 
of  aught  of  this  sort  in  his  case.  In  Ezek.  14:  14,  his1 
name  is  thrown  in  with  that  of  one  whom  Holy  Writ  repre- 
sents as  the  patientest  of  men.  He  was  exposed  to  much 
scoff  and  insult.  Whilst  engaged  in  collecting  the  materials 
for  the  construction  of  the  vessel  which  was  intended  to  float 
upon  the  waters,  and  whilst  occupied  in  building  it,  ridicule 
would  ply  its  weapons  diligently,  no  doubt ;  ridicule  —  than 
which  human  sensibilities  have  found  scarcely  anything 
harder  to  be  borne.  How  many  will  shrink  and  wither,  and 
abandon  an  enterprise,  or  desist  from  the  prosecution  of  an 
allotted  task,  or  cease  the  pursuit  of  a  course  prescribed  by 
duty,  rather  than  continue  to  encounter  its  terrible  inflictions 
or  bear  its  thrice-dreaded  stings.  Yet  our  patriarch  persisted 
in  the  execution  of  what  was  assigned  him,  in  the  face  of, 
notwithstanding  it  all,  and  kept  his  soul  in  patience. 

And  then,  again  :  Consider  the  faith  of  this  man,  as  to  its 
measure  and  its  influence.  The  Almighty  had  indicated  his 
purpose  to  destroy  mankind  for  their  wickedness  —  and  the 
means  by  which  his  purpose  should  be  accomplished.  Now, 
unbelief  might  have  said,  Surely  this  cannot  be  God's  voice  ; 
it  does  not  sound  like  a  Divine  denunciation  or  direction. 
Will  God  find  it  in  his  heart  to  destroy  every  living  thing,  — 
innocent  children  even,  and  cattle,  and  creeping  things  ?  'And 
where  will  he  find  water  enough  to  drown  the  world  ?  And 
how  will  those  living  things  which  appear  to  have  been  desig- 


CHARACTERISTICS    OF   THE    PATRIARCH.  81 

nated,  be  collected,  and  after  what  manner  preserved  in  the 
ark  ?  A  thousand  difficulties  might  by  unbelief  be  suggested, 
from  month  to  month,  during  the  progress  of  one  hundred  and 
twenty  years,  to  turn  him  aside  from  the  prosecution  of  such  a 
work  as  that  of  building  the  ark,  or  the  effecting  of  its  comple- 
tion. And  whilst  officiating  as  a  preacher  of  righteousness  — 
for  so  occupied,  in  a  greater  or  less  measure,  we  are  assured 
he  was,  (*2  Pet.  2:5;)  while  prosecuting  the  work  of  going 
from  place  to  place  extensively,  and  warning  the  people  of 
the  impending  storm  ;  giving  them  notice  of  the  threatened 
judgment;  and  calling  them  to  repentance  for  their  iniqui- 
ties ;  to  an  abandonment  of  their  vicious  and  highly  criminal 
excesses,  that  so  they  might  escape  both  temporal  and 
eternal  destruction,  Satan  and  wicked  men  might  very  fre- 
quently suggest  what  might  naturally  tend  to  originate  doubt 
in  Noah's  mind  whether,  indeed  there  was  ground  on  which 
to  base  a  reasonable  or  certain  conclusion  that  a  flood  would 
visit  the  earth  and  destroy  the  living  things,  rational  and 
irrational,  upon  its  surface,  unless  mankind  relented  and 
changed  their  course.  4  Yet,  in  the  case  of  our  patriarch,  faith 
had  such  potency,  this  principle  was  so  operative  and  influen- 
tial, that  he  perseveres  in  preaching,  remonstrating  with  and 
warning  the  ungodly  generation,  and  in  building  the  ark ;  no 
cessation  of  effort  was  there  to  bring  mankind  to  a  reformation 
of  their  manners,  and  the  restoration  of  the  true  religion  and 
Avorship  among  them  —  up  to  the  very  month  and  day  in  which 
the  appointed  period  of  Divine  patience  or  forbearance  was 
to  terminate  ;  or  at  least  until  the  ark  was  finished  and  ready 
to  receive  the  allotted  inmates.  What  faith,  what  faith  was 
that  which  reigned  in  the  heart  of  our  patriarch,  —  enough 
to  excite  the  admiration  of  human  kind  in  every  age  down- 
ward !  Can  we  fail  to  be  struck  with  amazement  at  its 
large  degree  and  its  effective  energy  ?  "  By  faith  Noah,  being 
warned  of  God  of  things  not  seen  as  yet,  prepared  an  ark  to 
the  saving  of  his  house ;  by  the  which  he  condemned  the  world, 


82  CHARACTERISTICS    OF    TttE   PATRIARCH. 

and  became  heir  of  the  righteousness  which  is  by  faith," 
(Heb.  11 :  7.) 

Noah's  courage  is  by  no  means  unworthy  of  note.  If  there 
ever  was  a  truly  and  eminently  courageous  man,  where  can 
you  succeed  better  in  finding  him  than  in  the  person  of  our 
patriarch  ?  We  have  said  he  was  "  a  preacher  of  righteous- 
ness." It  is  comparatively  easy  to  prosecute  such  a  calling 
where  public  sentiment  is  on  the  side  of  order  and  virtue ; 
but  a  hard  and  even  perilous  business  amidst  abounding 
corruption,  and  when  every  thing  evil  and  iniquitous  receives 
the  public  sanction  and  is  popular.  Yet  this  man  went  forth, 
undaunted,  undismayed,  instructing,  counselling,  reproving 
the  people ;  and  telling  them  that  within  such  a  space  of 
time  the  Almighty  Sovereign  would  by  a  flood  sweep  them 
from  life,  unless  they  should  seasonably  repent  and  turn  unto 
Him,  the  only  true  God  and  their  legitimate  Ruler.  How 
many  even  of  the  Lord's  professing  people  are  ashamed  or 
afraid  to  avow  their  abhorrence  of  the  evils  which  they  see 
commonly  practised.  "What  numbers,  through  a  base 
timidity  of  spirit,  will  wink  at  if  not  actually  yield  compliance 
with  what  their  hearts  condemn,  through  fear  of  reproach  or 
of  becoming  unpopular  —  losing  caste.  Instead  of  exerting 
themselves  the  more  in  opposition  to  sin  because  it  is 
countenanced  by  the  multitude,  they  cease  altogether  to 
oppose  the  ^torrent ;  the  voice  of  remonstrance  is  hushed ; 
they  become  mute  in  regard  to  prevailing  abominations  —  if 
they  do  not  even  become  apologists. 

Noah  lent  no  countenance  to  sin ;  he  boldly  reproved  it  in 
whatsoever  form  and  by  whomsoever  committed ;  and  against 
its  perpetrators  denounced  the  overwhelming  judgment  of  the 
Omnipotent  and  Infinitely  Just  One.  We  need  more  men  of 
courage,  of  iron  nerve  and  dauntless  heart,  and  on  the  altar 
of  whose  souls  flames  the  love  of  God,  in  our  day;  men  who 
are  not  afraid  to  be  singular  when  the  cause  of  godliness 
requires  it ;  and  who,  where  fidelity  and  duty  demand,  are 


CHARACTERISTICS    OF   THE   PATRIARCH.  83 

not  unwilling  to  expose  their  popularity,  and  temporal 
interests,  and  if  need  be,  what  is  so  much  dearer  even  as 
life,  to  hazard,  so  that  the  Ruler  Supreme  may  be  pleased 
and  served.  Our  second  father  could  not  have  proceeded  in 
the  building  of  the  ark  even,  unless  he  had  been  remarkably 
courageous.  He  would  have  shrunk  away  from  the  work  in 
fear  for  his  life,  long  ere  its  completion,  had  he  had  but  a 
modicum  of  the  spirit  of  a  coward  within  him.  Perseverance, 
under  the  circumstances,  exhibited  a  moral  heroism  such  as 
is  not  superabundant  in  our  or  any  age. 

And  omit  we  will  another  important  feature,  doubtless,  of 
our  patriarch's  moral  constitution  or  character,  if  we  fail  to 
hold  him  forth  as  a  man  of  benevolence  and  compassion.  It 
was  not  in  wrath  that  Noah  went  to  and  fro,  teaching  and 
admonishing,  rebuking  and  warning  the  corrupt  inhabitants 
of  the  Old  World ;  but,  on  the  contrary,  in  love  and  pity. 
He  did  not  pant  for  their  overthrow.  He  ardently  desired 
their  escape  from  the  menaced  judgment.  He  longed  for 
their  reformation,  so  iniquity  should  not  be  their  ruin.  Their 
prospective  destruction  must  have  wrung  many  tears  from 
his  eyes ;  caused  his  heart  to  bleed  not  a  little ;  and  he  no 
doubt  offered  much  prayer  to  God,  as  well  as  much  exhor- 
tation to  men.  Not  that  he  would  have  them  saved  in 
but  from  their  sins.  He  could  not  have  conceived  it  best, 
in  the  face  of  God's  decision,  to  have  their  evil  customs 
and  iniquitous  practices  perpetuated  —  handed  down  from 
father  to  son  in  endless  succession.  If  there  could  be  no 
reformation  he  would  give  his  vote  for  no  preservation.  He 
would  take  sides  with  God,  ay,  and  with  man  too,  as  to 
coming  generations.  Benevolence,  broad,  expansive,  would 
demand  that  no  such  dark  moral  flood  should  forever  roll 
over  the  world.  He  no  doubt  preferred,  in  coincidence  with 
the  Lord's  preference,  a  flood  of  waters  to  a  flood  of  sin. 
Noah,  it  may  be  believed,  so  executed  his  office  as  a 
preacher,  as  to  show  to  the  guilty  inhabitants  of  the  world 


84  IMPORT    OF    1    PETER,    3:    19,    20. 

before  the  flood,  that  he  really  desired  their  welfare  ;  wished 
their  salvation,  not  their  destruction.  "Whilst  their  unbelief, 
as  well  as  love  of  sin,  le'd  them  to  reject  his  counsel  as  un- 
called for,  they  could  not  really  harbor  a  suspicion  in  regard 
to  his  honesty  or  good  will.  They  thought  him  not  a  bad 
man,  but  a  weak,  credulous,  visionary,  deluded,  infatuated 
one.  Hence  his  teachings  and  remonstrances,  his  admoni- 
tions, exhortations,  and  warnings,  were  in  vain.  Those  ante- 
diluvians were  incorrigible. 

And  here  let  me  remark  that  the  words  in  1  Pet.  3: 
19,  20,  which  speak  of  Christ,  by  his  Spirit,  as  having  "gone 
and  preached  unto  the  spirits  in  prison,  which  sometimes 
were  disobedient  when  once  the  long  suffering  of  God  waited 
in  the  days  of  Noah,  while  the  ark  was  preparing,"  have 
appeared  to  some  very  mysterious  in  their  import,  whilst  by 
some  others  they  have  been  so  interpreted  as  to  favor  the 
doctrine  of  a  purgatory.  The  meaning  appears  to  be,  that 
the  Mediator,  God  the  second  person,  had,  by  his  Spirit,  in- 
spired his  servant  Noah  to  announce  to  the  wicked  antedilu- 
vians the  approaching  deluge,  and  preach  repentance  to  that 
incorrigible  generation,  who  persisted  in  their  sins,  and  were 
in  the  prison  of  hell,  (that  is,  the  adults  among  them,)  at  the 
time  the  apostle  wrote;  being  confined  there  till  the  judgment 
of  the  great  day.  For  they  had  "  some  time  been  dis- 
obedient "  and  unbelieving,  even  during  the  one  hundred  and 
twenty  years  of  God's  long  suffering,  after  the  deluge  was  pre- 
dicted, but  before  it  was  sent.  At  that  time  Noah  was  occupied 
in  preparing  the  ark,  showing  his  faith  by  his  works,  and  calling 
them  to  repent  and  seek  mercy  from  God.  But  they  unani- 
mously and  obstinately  rejected  his  message ;  and  thus  they 
were  destroyed  by  the  flood ;  whilst  only  eight  persons  had 
their  lives  preserved  in  the  ark,  being  delivered  from  the 
waters  and  carried  above  them:  so  that  the  floods  which 
drowned  all  others  without  exception,  concurred  in  their 
deliverance. 


EVENING    SIXTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN  : 

It  is  a  high  commendation  of  our  patriarch,  a  truly  notable 
encomium,  which  was  given  by  the  sacred  writer,  in  the 
closing  verse  of  the  6th  chapter  of  Genesis.  "  Thus  did 
Noah  ;  according  to  all  that  God  commanded  him,  so  did  he." 
Said  of  him  more  particularly  may  we  understand  this  to  be, 
in  reference  to  his  compliance  with  the  divine  directions 
respecting  the  building  and  replenishing  of  the  ark.  (Genesis 
6:  14-21.)  Viewed  in  all  its  circumstances,  Noah's  was 
one  of  the  sublimest  instances  of  obedience  ever  rendered  by 
a  fallen  man  to  his  Creator.  That  which  he  was  commanded 
to  build  was  a  vast  structure  —  a  work  of  years.  The  labor 
and  expense  necessary  to  be  incurred  in  the  procuring  and 
preparing  of  the  materials,  and  in  its  erection,  must  have 
been  immense.  It  was  a  strange  vessel,  as  well  as  large  — 
one  the  like  of  which  exactly,  whatever  other  water-craft 
might  have  before  fallen  under  his  observation,  he  had  never 
previously  witnessed ;  —  to  be  constructed  moreover  for  an 
unwonted  emergency  ;  —  and  the  derisive  assaults  and  re- 
proachful merriment,  if  naught  more  serious,  which,  in  ob- 
servance of  the  directions  he  had  received  in  regard  to  it,  he 
would  from  the  unbelieving,  profane  and  impious  crowd,  be 
obliged  to  encounter,  would  be  almost  beyond  endurance. 
Year  after  year  floated  by  ;  —  no  discernible  symptoms  of 
5 


86  THE  PATRIARCH'S  FIDELITY. 

the  menaced  judicial  or  punitive  visitation  made  their  ap- 
pearance, apart  from  those  barely  which  the  proclamation  of 
the  patriarch,  and  the  gradual,  protracted  preparing  of  the  ark, 
indicated.  Yet  under  the  impelling  influence  of  a  faith 
which  staggered  not,  and  of  regard  to  the  command  or  will  of 
Heaven,  he  entered  upon  and  continued  a  course  of  laborious 
action,  steadily,  for  a  not  inconsiderable  series  of  years. 
Boldly  faced  he  reproach  ;  meekly  encountered  he  scorn. 
Instead  of  swerving  or  shrinking  at  all  from  the  execution  of 
the  bidden  task,  under  the  apprehension  or  unavoidable  per- 
ception of  the  unpopularity  of  such  a  procedure,  he  persisted 
in  it  to  the  consummation.  Received  a  commission  he  had 
from  the  Lord  pertaining  to  the  instruction  and  warning  of 
the  people.  That  commission  he  concealed  not  through  fear ; 
he  perverted  not  out  of  regard  to  personal  convenience  or 
advantage.  He  proclaimed  the  predicted  judgment  of  God, 
and  protested  with  holy  earnestness  and  eloquence  against 
the  sins  of  his  contemporaries  —  their  debauchery  and  in- 
justice, their  idolatry  and  violence.  May  we  imitate  this 
noble  model,  young  gentlemen.  It  may  indeed  throw  us 
into  the  category  of  singularity ;  but  whose  fault  will  that  be  ? 
Was  it  Noah's  fault  that  he  was  a  singular  character  in  the 
Old  World  ?  a  man  of  peculiar  habits  or  conduct  ?  Was  it 
not  the  fault  of  those  whose  character  and  conduct  were 
of  so  discrepant  a  type  from  his  ?  —  of  those  who  refused  to 
listen  to  the  voice  of  Heavenly  love,  and  to  observe  the  man- 
dates proceeding  from  Infinite  authority  ?  And  would  not 
Noah  have  paid  a  very  unbecoming  deference  to  the  worldly 
and  degenerate  multitude,  had  he,  yielding  to  their  influence 
or  will,  consented  to  disregard  the  expressed  will  of  Heaven, 
and  to  perish  with  them,  rather  than  secure  the  divine  ap- 
proval and  his  own  salvation  ?  Let  us  not,  then,  carry  our 
complaisance  to  so  culpable  and  fearful  an  extent,  where 
we  have  such  a  God  as  ours  to  serve,  and  such  a  soul  as  ours 
at  stake.  We  may  feel  and  express  our  regret  at  being 


THE    ARK ITS    DIMENSIONS.  87 

compelled  to  be  singular;  may  assure  those  from  whom  we 
differ  that  we  are  not  so  for  singularity's  sake  ;  but  that,  like 
Noah,  we  feel  disposed  to  obey  God  rather  than  man,  where 
both  cannot  at  the  same  time  be  obeyed ;  and  that  we  deem 
it  incomparably  better  to  be  saved  with  Noah  and  his  little 
family,  than  to  perish  with  the  multitude. 

The  vessel  which  our  patriarch  was  commanded  to  build 
for  the  preservation  of  "  the  eight  souls,"  was,  as  has  been 
intimated,  one  of  no  inconsiderable  size.  Its  dimensions  are 
specified  in  Genesis  6:15.  From  that  account  it  will  ap- 
pear to  you  to  have  been  an  immense  structure  —  by  far  the 
largest  floating  edifice  ever  borne  upon  the  waters.  This 
will  hold  true,  without,  as  some  have  done,  taking  the  cubit 
in  the  verse  referred  to,  to  indicate  the  geometrical  cubit,  which 
contains  six  of  the  ordinary.  The  word  cubit  is  derived  from 
the  Latin  cubitus,  the  lower  arm.  It  is  used,  to  denote 
the  distance,  the  number  of  inches,  between  the  elbow  and 
the  extremity  of  the  middle  finger.  The  length  of  the  cubit 
has  in  different  nations  varied  according  to  the  diversity  in 
size  or  stature  of  the  people  respectively,  or  the  length  of  the 
lower  arm  —  the  distance  from  the  elbow  to  the  end  of  the 
middle  finger  of  their  men  of  average  size.  The  lesser  or 
common  cubit  is  reckoned  at  eighteen  inches.  The  Egyptian, 
or,  which  is  probably  the  same,  the  Hebrew  cubit,  was  twenty- 
one  inches  and  888  thousandths  —  nearly  twenty-two  inches. 
According  to  this  measure,  the  ark  was  in  length  about  547  feet ; 
in  width  ninety-one  feet,  two  inches,  and  in  height  forty-seven 
feet,  two  inches.  But  taking  even  the  shortest  cubit,  that  of 
eighteen  inches,  it  was  still  a  structure  of  immense  capacity. 
Says  Bush,  in  his  note  on  Genesis  6:  15,  "Taking  the  cubit 
of  least  length,  it  is  capable  of  demonstration  that  the  vessel 
must  have  been  of  the  burden  of  43,413  tons."  "  Now,"  con- 
tinues he,  "  a  first  rate  man-of-war  is  between  2,200  and  2,300 
tons ;  the  ark  consequently  possessed  a  capacity  of  storage 
equal  to  that  of  eighteen  ships  of  the  line  of  the  largest  class ; 


88  OF    WHAT    CONSTRUCTED. 

which  upon  a  moderate  computation  are  capable  of  carrying 
20,000  men,  with  stores  and  provisions  for  six  months'  con- 
sumption, besides  1800  pieces  of  cannon." 

The  chief  material  which  the  Lord  directed  to  be  employed 
in  the  construction  of  the  ark  was  gopher-wood,  ^Si  ^y  atze 
gopher,  mentioned  nowhere  else  in  the  Scriptures.  What 
particular  kind  of  wood  this  was,  we  can  be  aided  in  ascer- 
taining, only  from  the  name  ;  the  country  where  the  wood  is 
supposed  to  have  been  procured ;  or  from  the  traditional 
opinions  respecting  it.  The  Septuagint  have  rendered  it 
"  square  timbers ; "  and  Jerome,  in  the  Vulgate,  renders  it 
"  pitched  wood."  Some  have  adopted  the  opinion  that  a 
kind  of  pine  tree  is  intended,  and  the  Persian  translator  IMS 
the  pine  ;  but  Celsius  objects  that  this  kind  of  tree  was  never 
common  in  Babylonia  and  Assyria.  The  Chaldee  version 
and  some  others  give  the  cedar,  because  it  was  always  plenti- 
ful in  Asia,  and  was  distinguished  by  the  incorruptible 
nature  of  its  wood.  But  cedar  is  a  very  general  term,  and 
correctly  applied  only  to  different  kinds  of  juniper,  which, 
though  yielding  excellent  wood,  never  grow  to  a  large  size 
in  any  warm  country.  It  may  be  considered  doubtful  whether 
gopher  is  the  name  of  any  particular  species  of  tree.  Atze  go- 
pher, (Hebrew,)  perhaps  indicate  trees  or  woods  of  pitch,  i.  e., 
such  as  fir,  pine,  cypress,  turpentine,  cedar  and  other  trees  of  a 
pitchy  kind,  adapted  to  the  purpose  of  ship-building.  If  any 
particular  sort  of  tree  of  this  description  be  intended  more  than 
than  another,  it  is  probably  the  cypress,  (nvrrpiaaog))  as  the 
radical  consonants  in  the  Greek  and  Hebrew  words  are  the 
same,  and  as  the  cypress  is  eminently  distinguished  for  its 
durability,  and  the  power  of  resisting  injuries  incidental  to 
other  kinds  of  wood ;  while  its  resinous  properties  would 
tend  to  render  it  impervious  to  water.  The  greater  number 
of  writers,  for  such  reasons  as  those  just  stated,  have  under- 
stood the  cypress  to  be  meant ;  and  this  opinion  is  supported 
by  such  authorities  as  Fuller,  Bochart,  and  Celsius. 


WHERE    BUILT*  89 

As  to  the  tradition  mentioned  by  Bedford  and  others,  that 
Noah,  failing  of  success  in  reclaiming  his  superlatively  impi- 
ous and  obdurate  contemporaries,  and  finding  himself  and 
family  in  manifest  danger  of  some  mortal  violence  for  his 
good  will,  departed  from  the  land  where  he  had  formerly 
resided,  and  settled  in  a  desert  region  called  Cyparisson,  (so 
named  from  the  abundance  of  cypress  trees  growing  there  ;) 
and,  because  of  the  facilities  thus  afforded,  there  built  the 
ark,  —  suffice  it  to  say,  that  no  sufficient  evidence  can  be 
adduced  in  its  support.  Probability  seems  to  us  to  favor  the 
idea  that  to  impress  them  more  fully  with  the  certainty  of  the 
threatened  judgment,  our  patriarch  began  and  continued  to 
prosecute  his  task  openly,  and  in  the  sight,  so  to  speak,  of  all 
men.  It  appears  probable,  moreover,  that  he  assured  the 
multitude  of  that  region  from  day  to  day,  and  endeavored  to 
have  the  intelligence  borne  abroad,  that  what  he  engaged  in 
doing  was  by  divine  command,  and  that  the  object  of  his  la- 
bor was  to  preserve  himself  and  household  from  the  ruin 
which  was  impending  over  the  world.  And  thus  every  plank 
he  added,  and  every  spike  he  drove,  would  be  an  additional 
warning  of  the  certain  and  terrible  doom  which  awaited  them, 
unless  by  timely  repentance  and  reformation  it  should  be 
averted.  As  for  hazard  of  losing  his  life,  Noah  knew  that  it 
was  not  to  be  apprehended.  He  had  the  unwavering  con- 
viction in  his  mind  that  if  God  assign  a  human  creature  a 
duty  to  perform,  that  creature,  cherishing  the  spirit  of  obedi- 
ence, is  immortal  until  the  allotted  work  be  done.  We  can 
account  for  Noah's  preservation  in  an  age  when  holiness  was 
so  hated,  pious  admonition  so  repugnant,  and  when  violence 
so  reigned,  on  no  other  ground  than  that  of  special  divine 
protection.  "  The  name  of  the  Lord  is  a  strong  Tower ;  the 
righteous  runneth  into  it  and  is  safe." 

It  may  not  be  amiss  to  glance  at  some  other  specified  par- 
ticulars relative  to  the  ark's  construction,  (Gen.  6:  14-16.) 
"  Rooms  shalt  thou  make  in  the  ark,"  Hebrew,  nests.  These 


90  ITS    PARTICULAR     CONSTRUCTION. 

were  cells,  or  stalls,  or  small  apartments,  into  which  the  inte- 
rior of  the  structure  was  laid  out,  for  the  different  kinds  of 
animals.  "  With  lower,  second,  and  third  stories  shalt  thou 
make  it."  This  shows  that  there  was  no  waste  space  in  this 
vast  fabric.  Every  foot  of  its  enormous  area,  from  bottom 
to  top,  was  carefully  laid  out  in  receptacles  for  the  accommo- 
dation of  the  living  inmates  intended  for  it.  The  larger 
animals  probably  were  assigned  their  place  in  the  lower 
story ;  smaller  in  the  second ;  birds,  reptiles,  &c.,  in  the 
upper.  "  A  window  shalt  thou  make  to  the  ark."  The  term 
window  is  probably  used  here  collectively,  indicating  the  means 
of  admitting  light ;  a  transparency  or  at  least  translucency  ; 
if  not  something  equivalent  to  glass,  at  least  something  ad- 
mitting a  measure  of  light.  "  And  in  a  cubit  shalt  thou  finish 
it  above;"  or,  to  a  cubit  shalt  thou  reduce  it  at  the  top  — 
seeming  to  indicate  that  the  roof  in  which  the  translucency 
or  series  of  windows  or  skylights  was  set,  sloped  upward  to  a 
ridge  at  the  top,  of  about  a  cubit  in  width.  "  The  door  of 
the  ark  shalt  thou  set  in  the  side  thereof."  This  aperture 
must  have  been  of  considerable  size,  intended  as  it  was  for 
ingress,  among  others,  of  some  large  animals.  Prof.  Bush 
thinks  the  word  translated  door  is  to  be  taken  in  a  collective 
sense,  implying  a  number  of  openings  in  the  different  stories 
of  the  ark,  designed  for  entrances  for  the  animals,  and  after- 
wards for  the  admission  of  air,  and  the  discharge  of  ordure. 
These  apertures,  he  says,  might  ordinarily  be  closed  by  lattice 
work. 

Although  in  Hebrews  11:7,  and  9  :  4,  the  same  Greek 
word,  kibotos,  is  used  to  denote  the  ark  of  Noah  and  the  ark 
of  the  covenant,  yet  the  Hebrew  terms  are  different  —  that 
denoting  the  former  being  tebat,  and  the  one  indicating  the 
latter  arun.  The  exact  form  of  the  ark  of  Noah  is  not  stated 
by  the  sacred  historian  —  the  specified  length  and  breadth 
and  height  leaving  certain  other  matters  indeterminate. 
As  it  was  constructed  not  so  much  with  a  view  to  progressive 


HOW   LONG   IN   BUILDING.  91 

motion,  as  to  float  for  a  given  time  upon  the  water,  it  is  not 
necessary  to  suppose  it  to  have  been  modelled  like  the  hull 
of  a  modern  ship  ;  or  placed  in  a  sort  of  boat,  as  in  the  com- 
mon figure.  The  simple  idea  given  in  the  history  is  that  of 
an  enormous  oblong  box,  secured  upon  a  strong  and  thick 
rafting  floor.  Had  it  been  built  from  a  keel,  with  a  curving 
bottom  like  a  ship,  it  could  not  have  well  rested  on  the  dry 
land  after  the  flood,  without  falling  over  upon  one  or  the  other 
side,  to  the  imminent  danger  of  all  its  tenants.  Moreover, 
it  is  obvious  that  it  was  unfurnished  with  rudder  or  sails. — 
"  Thou  shalt  pitch  it  within  and  without  with  pitch."  The 
pitch  here  spoken  of  was  some  kind  of  bituminous  substance, 
which  from  its  soft  and  pliable  qualities  was  well  adapted  to 
smearing  over  the  ark,  and  closing  every  chink  and  crevice. 
A  coat,  spread  over  the  inside  and  outside,  would  make  it 
perfectly  water  proof,  and  the  more  so  as  the  substance  itself 
would,  it  is  probable,  be  constantly  acquiring  greater  hardness 
and  tenacity. 

Should  you,  young  gentlemen,  be  asked  this  question : 
"  How  many  of  the  one  hundred  and  twenty  years  was  Noah 
actually  employed  in  providing  the  materials  and  building 
the  large  vessel  ?  "  —  what  would  be  your  reply  ?  That  he  was 
the  whole  of  those  years  thus  occupied,  Bedford  (see  his  Chro- 
nology, p.  21,  note,)  by  comparing  Gen.  6 :  3  with  1  Pet. 
3  :  20,  thinks  to  be  very  evident.  But  although  the  ark  was 
a  vast  structure,  and  was  confessedly  the  work  of  years,  yet  it 
has  by  more  or  less  been  imagined  that  a  considerably  shorter 
period  than  the  forementioned  was  abundantly  sufficient  for  the 
accomplishment  of  the  task  ;  and  they  imagine  that  such  a 
length  of  time  as  the  whole  period  of  forbearance  to  be  thus 
occupied,  would  require  a  concurrence  of  miracles  to  prevent 
that  part  of  the  vessel  which  was  first  built  from  suffering 
decay  ere  the  last  part  of  it  should  be  finished.  As  to  the 
time  employed  in  providing  the  materials  and  in  building  it 
we  will  not  be  able  to  come  to  a  determinate  conclusion  until, 


92  "NOAH'S   CARPENTERS." 

especially,  we  can  ascertain  how  many  workmen,  besides  Noah 
and  his  three  sons,  were  occupied  in  its  construction.  You 
have  heard,  we  presume,  the  story  about  Noah's  carpenters  ; 
how,  though  employed  in  building  the  ark,  they  did  not  enter 
it ;  helped  others  to  the  means  of  salvation  whilst  themselves, 
through  unbelief,  perished.  The  like  of  which  occurs  even 
at  this  day,  —  numbers,  by  their  contributions,  helping  others 
to  the  means  of  grace,  who,  through  the  improvement  of  them, 
enter  first  the  gospel  ark,  and  then  heaven,  whilst  the  former, 
through  unbelief,  enter  neither  ;  perish  in  their  sins. 

We  hinted,  we  believe,  before,  that  intimations  were  proba- 
bly received  by  our  patriarch,  concerning  the  divine  intention 
to  destroy  mankind  by  a  Deluge,  years  anterior  to  the  time 
in  which  he  received  a  command  from  God  to  prepare  an  ark 
for  the  saving  of  himself  and  household.  Is  it  not  note- 
worthy, that  Noah  and  family  were  saved  by  the  same  ele- 
ment by  which  the  rest  of  mankind  perished  ?  —  the  like  of 
which  takes  place  in  reference  to  the  gospel ;  which  is  a 
savor  of  life  to  some,  while  it  is  a  savor  of  death  unto 
others. 

Was  the  ark,  built  by  Noah,  the  first  example  of  naval 
architecture  ?  Did  the  art  of  the  shipwright  originate  in  this 
remarkable  structure  ?  We  think  not.  It  can  scarcely  be 
believed  that  man  had  been  so  long  on  the  earth,  so  vastly 
multiplied  as  to  numbers,  and  of  course  so  extended  as  to 
settlement,  without  a  resort  to  some  means,  and  convenient 
means  too,  for  crossing  rivers  and  even  seas.  It  is  incredible 
that  the  state  of  the  arts  should  have  been  so  low  amongst 
the  antediluvians,  with  all  the  advantages  which  they  enjoyed, 
as  that  they  should  remain,  up  to  the  period  under  considera- 
tion, destitute  of  all  knowledge  of  an  art  with  which  the 
most  savage  nations  on  the  globe  in  modern  times  are  not 
unacquainted.  Besides,  the  very  instructions  given  to  our 
patriarch  in  regard  to  the  making  cf  the  ark,  are  of  such  a 
character,  so  few  and  so  general,  as  to  imply  that  they  were 


DATE    OF   NAVAL    ARCHITECTURE.  03 

addressed  to  one  who  would  be  at  no  loss  as  to  the  working  out 
or  filling  up  of  the  details.  So  large  a  vessel,  and  answering,  as 
it  would  appear,  so  exactly  the  purpose  for  which  it  was  de- 
signed, and  yet  with  such  a  paucity  and  vagueness  of  directions, 
we  may  be  assured,  could  not  have  been  constructed  by  a 
novice ;  by  one  who  had  never  before  seen  a  floating  building. 
The  progress  of  the  arts  among  the  antediluvians,  of  which 
we  have  on  a  former  occasion  spoken,  likewise  forbids  the 
supposition  that  this  was  the  first  naval  structure.  But, 
say  you,  if  nautical  craft  had  been  previously  in  existence, 
and  the  mariner's  vocation  understood,  why  did  not  mul- 
titudes of  the  antediluvians  avail  themselves  of  these 
facilities  for  escaping  a  watery  grave  ?  A  very  rational 
question,  truly.  The  reply  to  it  which  we  would  give  is,  that 
the  same  cause  which  kepft  the  Israelites  so  long  out  of 
Canaan,  and  which  keeps  so  many  sinners  in  every  age  from 
entering  the  ship  that  plies  between  earth  and  heaven,  ope- 
rated to  prevent  the  inhabitants  of  the  Old  World  from  having 
recourse  to  any  means  of  escape  from  the  inundation  caused 
by  the  descending  torrents,  and  by  the  rapid  rush  of  waters 
already  on  the  earth.  They  were  overtaken  unexpectedly ; 
not  so  much  from  a  want  of  antecedent  warning,  but  from  a 
want  of  belief  in  the  truth  of  the  message  that  God  had 
caused  to  be  borne  to  them.  They  perished  just  as  sinners 
in  Christendom  do  now  —  through  unbelief. 

Concerning  what  part  of  the  world  it  was  in  which  Noah 
built  the  ark  there  has  been  some  diversity  of  conjecture. 
We  say,  conjecture  —  for  where  Moses  has  given  no  direct 
or  definite  information  respecting  matters  so  ancient,  much 
of  what  professes  to  be  knowledge  is  better  entitled  to  the 
name  of  conjecture.  One  supposes,  strangely  enough,  that 
he  built  it  in  Palestine,  and  that  he  planted  the  cedars  of 
which  he  made  it,  in  the  plains  of  Sodom.  Another  conceives 
it  to  have  been  built  near  Mount  Caucasus,  that  outlying 
member  of  the  Asiatic  highlands.  A  third,  in  China,  where 
5* 


94  THE    WARNING,    HOW   PROMULGATED. 

he  imagines  Noah  dwelt  before  the  flood.  The  greater  num- 
ber of  writers  appear  to  favor  the  idea  that  it  was  built  in 
Chaldea  or  Babylonia,  where  history  relates  that  there  was 
so  great  a  quantity  of  cypress,  in  the  groves,  in  the  time  of 
Alexander  the  Great,  that  that  prince  built  a  whole  fleet  out 
of  it,  for  want  of  other  timber.  And  the  conjecture  appears 
confirmed  by  the  Chaldean  tradition,  which  makes  Xisuthrus 

—  thought  to  be  another  name  for  Noah  —  set  sail  from  that 
country.     Bedford  has  a  chapter,  entitled,  "Of   the  place 
where  Noah  built  the  ark,"  (Chronology,  chapter  9th).     "  The 
place,"  says  he,  "  where  Noah  and  his  family  built  the  ark  was 
most  probably  in  the  land  of  Shinar,  near  the  river  Tigris  on 
the  northeast  side  of  Babylon ; "  and  he  refers  to  Bochart's 
Phaleg,  lib.  1,  ch.  4,  in  confirmation  of  his  opinion. 

In  Gen.  6  :  8,  we  have  the  words,  "  With  thee  will  I  estab- 
lish my  covenant"  —  words  addressed  by  the  Lord  to  our 
patriarch.  In  them  there  is  reference  to  an  express  arrange- 
ment into  which  the  Deity  entered,  to  save  Noah  and  the 
other  seven  from  the  general  ruin.  This  was  said  to  him 
immediately  subsequent  to  his  reception  of  the  command  and 
directions  in  regard  to  the  building  of  the  ark ;  and  it  served, 
no  doubt,  to  encourage  and  animate  him  in  the  commencement 
and  prosecution  of  so  arduous  and  expensive  an  undertaking 

—  and  one  which,  as  has  been  formerly  intimated,  would 
subject  him  to  much  mockery  and  opposition. 

We,  a  few  evenings  since,  spoke  of  Noah's  officiating  as  a 
preacher  of  righteousness  ;  of  his  admonishing  and  warning 
the  inhabitants  of  the  Old  World,  and  calling  them  to  repent- 
ance. Now,  if  there  were  no  others  to  promulgate  the 
intelligence  and  spread  the  warning,  would  not  most  of  the 
multitudinous  and  extended  population  of  the  globe  have  re- 
mained ignorant  and  unwarned  of  what  awaited  them  ?  And, 
had  all  received  the  monitory  notice  and  urgent  call  to  refor- 
mation, of  what  avail  would  it  have  been  if  the  Almighty 
Sovereign  had  determined  to  destroy  all  mankind,  with  the 


RIGHTEOUS,    HOW     MANY.  95 

* 

bare  exception  of  "  the  eight  souls  ?  "  To  such  interrogatories, 
the  response  may  be  given  —  That,  had  none  beside  Noah, 
cordially  and  with  dutiful  assiduity,  engaged  in  the  tuitionary 
and  monitory  work  alluded  to ;  had  the  people  of  one  neighbor- 
hood, and  then  another,  and  still  another,  as  they  received  the 
information  and  warning  from  the  lips  of  our  patriarch,  but 
conversed  and  clamored  about,  and  grumblingly  and  noisily 
trumpeted  forth  what  had  been  proclaimed  to  them  by  this 
herald  of  God ;  or,  on  the  other  hand,  had  the  multitudes  who 
actually  heard  him,  duly  regarded  his  monitory  utterances, 
and  wisely  heeded  and  improved  his  warm  and  kindly  intend- 
ed calls,  and  made  them  the  theme  of  conversation  in  tfre 
company  of  all  with  whom  they,  one  after  another,  came  in 
contact,  —  why,  then,  some  time  ere  the  expiration  of  the  one 
hundred  and  twenty  years,  the  substance  of  Noah's  promul- 
gations, it  might  be  rationally  believed,  would  have  reached 
the  entire  human  family  then  occupying  a  place  on  the  earth's 
surface.  And  as  to  the  second  question,  if,  upon  receiving 
the  intelligence,  call,  and  warning,  a  general  repentance  and 
reformation  had  ensued,  the  opinion  may  be  indulged,  that,  as 
in  the  case  of  Nineveh,  (Jonah,  3d  ch.,)  a  respite  or  release 
from  the  threatened  doom  would  have  been  granted.  May 
we  not  entertain  the  idea  that,  had  even  a  few  of  them  exer- 
cised contrition,  and,  by  faith,  sought  admission  into  the  ark, 
it  would  have  been  opened  to  as  many  as  it  could  contain  ? 
and,  moreover,  that,  if  still  larger  numbers  had,  in  humble 
and  penitent  faith,  prepared  arks,  they  also  might  have  been 
preserved  ? 

In  Genesis  6 :  8,  9,  it  is  remarked,  that  "  Noah  found  grace 
in  the  eyes  of  the  Lord ;  and  that  he  was  a  just  or  righteous 
man,  and  perfect  in  his  generations."  As  this  language  is 
emphatic,  and  is  apparently  expressive  of  a  peculiarity,  you 
may  be  tempted  to  inquire  —  Was  there  at  that  time  no 
righteous  man  on  the  globe,  excepting  this  patriarch  ?  —  no 
human  being  beside,  who  enjoyed  the  divine  favor?  Our 


96  RIGHTEOUS,   HOW  'MANY. 

answer  is  —  No  one,  as  the  language  seems  clearly  to  inti- 
mate, of  the  same  generation  with  our  patriarch,  (Gen.  7:1); 
no  one  born  as  late  as  he,  excepting,  of  course,  members  of 
his  own  family.  We  are,  indeed,  not  informed  by  the  record, 
that  any  of  "  the  eight  souls  "  embraced  in  the  covenant,  so 
"  Jj*  called  in  the  eighteenth  verse,  was  pious  beside  Noah  himself. 
Some  infer,  from  the  so  individual  character  of  the  language 
used,  that  no  other  than  he  was  truly  pious.  We  have  been 
accustomed  to  regard  some  of  the  rest,  particularly  Noah's 
wife,  and  Shem  and  his  wife,  as,  at  that  time,  the  subjects  of 
divine  grace.  We  have  also  been  disposed  to  look  with 
respect  upon  Japheth  and  his  conjugal  companion.  There 
are  historic  intimations,  certainly,  quite  favorable  to  Japheth's 
character ;  that,  for  instance,  in  Genesis  9  :  23. 

Noah's  father  was,  probably,  a  righteous  man  ;  and  he,  as 
you  were  in  a  former  Exercise  told,  lived  until  five  years 
before  the  flood.  Noah's  grandfather,  Methuselah,  may  also 
be  believed  to  have  been  a  renewed  man,  and  a  subject  of  the 
divine  favor ;  and  he  lived,  as  you  have  heard,  until  the  very 
year  of  the  deluge;  yes,  and  to  the  very  month  —  perhaps 
week.  You  remember,  we  formerly  spoke  of  the  meaning  of 
the  name  Methuselah,  and  that  his  father  Enoch  gave  him 
this  name  prophetically,  as  indicating  that  his  death  and  the 
coming  of  the  flood  should  be  simultaneous.  Methuselah, 
(from  methu  and  sela,)  has  been  understood  to  mean  about 
this :  when  he  is  dead,  shall  ensue  an  emission  or  inundation 
of  waters,  to  the  destruction  of  the  whole  earth.  This  in- 
genious conjecture  of  Bochart,  in  his  Phaleg,  may  be  con- 
sidered as  carrying  with  it  more  of  the  air  of  probability, 
than  any  other  account  of  his  name.  Not  only  did  he  die  the 
very  year  of  the  flood,  but,  Jewish  writers  will  have  it,  seven 
days  before,  referring  to  Genesis  7:10;  and  that  he  was 
taken  away  from  the  evil  to  come.  One  Jew  has  chosen  to 
be  even  more  minute  as  to  the  time  of  his  removal.  Let  me, 
as  a  morceau,  give  you  this  Jew's  story. 


A    CURIOUS    STORT.  97 

He  relates  that  "  when  Noah  had  entered  the  ark,  he  stayed 
there  for  some  time,  and  the  flood  came  not ;  which,  when  he 
perceived,  he  said  unto  God:  O,  thou  Lord  of  the  world, 
wherefore  hast  thou  brought  me  into  the  ark?  either  that 
thou  shouldst  kill  me,  or  that  thou  shouldst  preserve  me  alive  ? 
And  God  answered  him,  That  I  might  preserve  thee  alive. 
And  Noah  said  again,  If  it  is  so,  why  do  we  sit  here  in  the 
ark,  and  the  flood  doth  not  come  ?  It  had  been  better*  for  us 
to  have  tarried  on  the  earth.  And  God  answered  again,  and 
said  unto  him,  There  is  still  one  old  man  upon  the  earth  who 
is  perfectly  just,  and  for  his  sake  the  flood  cannot  come  upon 
the  earth,  as  long  as  he  lives.  And  Noah  said  again,  O, 
Lord  of  the  world,  who  is  that  just  man  ?  And  God  answer- 
ed him,  It  is  Methuselah,  thy  elder.  And  Noah  said,  Since 
this  is  so,  bring  him  in  to  us,  that  so  the  flood  may  come  upon 
the  world,  as  thou  hast  said.  And  God  answered,  He  shall 
not  live  above  a  week,  and  when  he  is  dead  and  buried,  the 
flood  shall  immediately  follow.  Within  which  space  of  time 
Methuselah  died,  and  the  flood  came  accordingly."  This 
story  is  taken  from  Bedford's  Chronology,  closing  part  of 
chapter  10. 


EVENING   SEVENTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN  : 

We  now  enter,  more  directly,  upon  the  consideration  of  an 
interesting  and  thrilling  portion  of  sacred  history ;  the  most 
remarkable  physical  event  which,  since  man's  creation,  the 
world  has  ever  witnessed;  and,  contemplated  in  a  moral 
aspect,  as  an  event  occurring  under  the  divine  administration, 
and  with  which  God  is  represented  as  having,  so  to  speak, 
specially  to  do,  it  ought  not  only  to  excite  our  interest,  but 
deserves  to  be  pondered  thoroughly.  The  portion  of  history 
to  which  we  allude,  is  commenced  in  the  seventh  chapter  of 
Genesis  and  concluded  in  the  eighth.  You  will  not  consider 
me  as  asking  too  much,  if  I  request  you  to  have  your  Bibles 
open  before  you  at  this  part,  for  the  sake  of  more  easy  and 
ready  reference.  In  relation  to  the  event  here  brought 
prominently  to  view,  the  truth  of  the  history  that  narrates  it 
has  been,  especially  of  late,  and  is  still,  a  good  deal  called  in 
question. 

Some  pious  minds,  even  some  biblical  expounders,  have 
become  alarmed  at  the  promulgated  results  of  geological 
investigation,  and,  more  especially,  at  the  positiveriess  and 
boldness,  in  certain  quarters,  of  geological  hypothesis  and 
inference.  That  a  portion  of  what  is  termed  science,  is 
"science  falsely  so  called,"  it  requires,  indeed,  no  large 
amount  of  sagacity  to  discover.  That  skepticism  has,  of  late 


DISTRUST    OF   GEOLOGY   UNREASONABLE.  99 

years,  been  greatly  emboldened  by  the  progress  of  geological 
discovery,  and  has  manifested  a  very  strong  anxiety  to  create, 
and,  in  every  way,  magnify,  at  first  sight  apparent  discrepan- 
cies between  science  and  revelation,  or  the  works  and  the 
word  of  God,  we  must  have  been  actually  asleep  if  we  have 
not  discerned.  And  some  pious  readers  and  expositors  of 
Scripture,  having  been  unwilling  in  the  least  to  modify  their 
interpretation  of  the  sacred  history  relating  to  the  creation 
and  the  deluge,  have  so  doggedly  set  themselves  against,  and 
resolutely  decried,  ascertained  and  settled  geological  facts  — 
unhesitatingly  denouncing  them  as  fancies  —  as,  no  doubt,  to 
increase  the  evil  which  they  would  wish  to  see  suppressed; 
as  to  confirm  the  before  unconfirmed  skeptic,  and  kindle 
flickering  unbelief  into  something  more  nearly  approximating 
a  flame. 

It  is  our  ardent  wish,  that  the  friends  of  the  Bible  should 
indulge  no  fears  lest  the  progress  of  science,  in  any  of  its 
departments,  should  tend  to  undermine  the  Christian  fabric, 
or  ignore  the  sacred  Scriptures  as  a  divine  revelation.  From 
the  advancement  of  true  science,  we  may  justly  expect  to 
derive  important  aid  in  arriving  at  a  correct  understanding 
of  different  portions  of  the  word  of  God.  As  Christians,  hail 
we,  with  more  than  stinted  joy,  every  step  taken  on  the 
threshold,  and  to  be  taken  in  the  interior  of  the  great  temple 
of  nature.  It  aids  us  in  treading,  with  clearer,  safer,  firmer 
step,  and  with  a  soul  elevated  and  kindled  into  ravishment, 
the  more  magnificent  and  beautiful  temple  of  God's  special 
revelation.  We  have  no  sympathies,  then,  with  the  decriers 
of  geology,  or  of  any  other  true  science.  We  look  for  good, 
and  only  good,  finally  to  flow,  from  its  every  spring,  to  the 
cause  of  that  precious  religion  which  the  Holy  Scriptures  were 
given,  by  the  great  Author  of  all  good,  to  teach.  That  "  a 
little  learning  is  a  dangerous  thing,"  was  discovered  before 
the  modern  discoveries  were  made  in  geology  and  its  cognates. 
A  smattering  of  a  thing  may  leave  the  mind  in  a  fog,  encir- 


100  SCIENCE    AND    SCRIPTURE     HARMONIOUS. 

cled  in  which,  it  may  run  on  some  dangerous  shoal  or  rock, 
and  founder  or  go  to  wreck ;  but  those  who  penetrate  beyond, 
without  meeting  with  any  disaster,  will  find  a  region  of  whole- 
some atmosphere  and  clear  sky,  where  the  rays  of  nature  and 
revelation  delightfully  commingle,  and  prove  to  each  other 
subsidiary  in  constituting  a  bright  and  glorious  day. 

Within  reach  of  the  candid  inquirer,  there  is  ample  inde- 
pendent evidence,  indeed,  that  the  Bible  is  what  it  professes 
to  be :  the  Word  of  the  living  God.  There  is  evidence 
external,  historical,  from  prophecy  and  miracle ;  and  there  is 
delightful  evidence  internal ;  and,  whilst  the  former  is  to  be 
held  in  high  and  grateful  appreciation,  we  may  say  of  this 
latter,  that  the  plain,  unsophisticated,  and  sincere  reader  of 
the  sacred  pages  cannot  help  but  find  it,  ay,  and  feel  it  too. 
Many,  such  is  their  depravity,  or  perverse  obstinacy,  or 
reckless  obduracy,  will  not  read  in  order  to  find  either  of  the 
kinds  of  evidence  alluded  to.  You,  young  gentlemen,  do  not 
need  that  we  should  stop  in  our  historic  course,  or  turn  aside, 
to  deliver  a  series  of  lectures  on  the  evidences  in  support  of 
the  Scriptures  as  a  divine  revelation.  You  have  not  lived 
to  this  day,  or  been  the  sons  of  such  sires,  without  having 
studied  and  become  thoroughly,  as  well  as  intelligently,  con- 
vinced, that  the  Bible  is  neither  a  stupid  nor  a  cunningly 
devised  fable.  As  to  the  true  Christian  —  and  more  than  one 
of  you,  we  are  happy  to  believe,  is  such  —  he  has,  superadded, 
experimental  evidence,  that  our  sacred  volume  is  neither  from 
Satan  nor  wicked  men. 

Let  what  has  been  now  dropped  suffice  on  this  head,  only 
adding,  "Let  God  be  true,  but  every  man  a  liar; "  and  that 
if  any  dogma  or  tenet,  professing  to  be  the  result  of  scientific 
investigation  or  discovery,  contravene  any  plainly  revealed  or 
correctly  understood  truth  or  fact  taught  in  the  Bible,  the 
former  should  not  be  received  as  true  —  is  not  entitled  to 
credence.  There  may  be  a  misinterpreting  of  parts  of  nature, 
or  of  parts  of  revelation,  one  or  both :  if  of  either,  a  discrep- 


THE    ARK    ENTERED.  101 

ancy  of  course  will  ensue ;  there  will  be  a  want  of  harmony 
in  the  opinions  entertained  or  embraced ;  truth  and  error  will 
come  in  conflict.  In  order  to  coalescence  there  must  be  a 
review  and  a  correction  of  the  misinterpretation,  on  which- 
soever side  it  lie.  This  being  done,  there  will  appear  no 
hostile  or  warring  utterances  between  the  two  great  things  of 
which  God  is  alike  the  author :  the  volume  of  Nature,  and 
that  inestimably  precious  volume  which  we  call  THE  BIBLE. 
He  who  addresses  you  thinks  he  has  just  as  much  reason  to 
believe  the  universe  to  be  a  lie,  as  he  has  to  believe  the  con- 
tents of  the  Bible  to  be  but  "old  wives'  fables"  It  is  hardly 
requisite  to  say,  that  he  finds  no  reason  to  believe  either.  Let 
us  now  proceed  with  the  history. 

The  allotted  period  of  the  divine  forbearance  having  ex- 
pired, and  the  ark  being  ready,  Noah  is  commanded  by  the 
Lord  to  enter  it,  with  his  wife,  his  three  sons,  and  their 
wives,  (ch.  7:1.)  What  else  he  was  directed  to  introduce, 
may  be  seen  stated  in  the  second  and  third  verses.  You  dis- 
cover, in  the  second  verse,  a  distinction  indicated  between 
beasts  clean  and  unclean.  Such  distinction  existed  both 
before  and  after  the  flood  ;  but,  it  would  seem,  not  precisely 
on  the  same  ground.  Before,  the  unclean  were  so 
considered  and  called,  solely  because  they  were  not  to  be  used 
for  sacrifice  ;  after,  because  there  were  some  which  were  not 
to  be  made  use  of  either  for  this  purpose,  or  for  food,  (Lev. 
11 ;  Deut.  14.) 

Wish  to  know  you  may,  young  gentlemen,  how  all  the 
living  creatures  which  were  to  become  inmates,  together  with 
the  provisions  requisite  for  their  sustenance,  could  be  got 
ready,  and  stored  in  the  ark,  so  expeditiously.  Michaelis  has 
advanced  the  opinion  that  our  patriarch  occupied  much  of  the 
one  hundred  and  twenty  years  of  forbearance  and  warning  in 
collecting  these  together.  But  we  might  then  ask,  how 
without  a  special  revelation  could  Noah  have  ascertained  that 
his  collection  was  complete  ?  Arid  how,  without  an  incredible 


102  THE  NOACHIC  DELUGE  BEGUN. 

knowledge  of  Natural  History,  could  he  have  avoided  over- 
charging his  vessel  with  specimens  of  varieties  of  the  same 
species  of  animal  ?  Is  it  not  much  more  credible,  as  well  as 
much  more  in  accordance  with  other  parts  of  the  transaction, 
to  suppose  that  the  various  living  things  which  were  intended 
for  the  ark,  were  preternaturally  guided  to  this  their  destined 
place  of  shelter  ? 

At  the  end  of  seven  days  —  the  intermediate  period  being 
allowed  for  the  admittance  and  arrangement  of  every  thing 
in  their  appropriate  places  in  the  floating  edifice  —  the 
heavens  began  to  pour  down  rain,  and  those  portions  of  the 
globe  where  the  waters  were  stored  to  pour  forth  their  liquid 
treasures  over  the  before  dry  land,  (ch.  7  :  11.)  The  first  of 
these  you  observe  to  be  expressed  in  the  highly  figurative 
and  beautiful,  but  peculiar  phraseology,  "  the  windows  of 
heaven  were  opened."  The  original  term  tvo^ia  aruboth 
being  applied  to  such  windows  as  are  made  of  lattice  work, 
Prof.  Bush,  from  this  circumstance,  in  connection  with  the 
declaration  of  their  being  opened,  makes  the  language  imply 
that  the  water,  instead  of  gently  descending  in  drops,  as  if 
mada  to  percolate  through  a  net-work  medium,  fell  in  tor- 
rents like  waterspouts,  as  if  the  windows  had  been  opened  for 
this  purpose  on  hinges,  and  every  obstruction  were  removed. 
If  this  be  not  fanciful,  then  the  marginal  rendering  of  "  sluices 
or  flood-gates,"  though  wholly  paraphrastic,  is  well  suited  to" 
the  idea.  This  intensive  interpretation  of  the  phraseology 
just  quoted,  and  that  which  is  given  by  the  same  expositor  to 
the  language  respecting  the  "  breaking  up  of  the  fountains  of 
the  deep,"  do  not,  indeed,  as  we  may  have  occasion  here- 
after to  see,  accord  with  the  tranquil  theory  of  some  dis- 
tinguished modern  geologists.  We  will  here  merely  drop 
the  remark,  that  it  would  not  greatly  surprise  us,  if,  after  a 
pretty  thorough  examination  of  the  modus  of  the  flood's 
occurrence,  you  should  find  yourselves  favorably  inclined  to 
the  opinion  that  the  truth  somewhere  interlies  the  two  ex- 


AT   WHAT   TIME   OF   THE    TEAR.  103 

tremes.  That  strong  expression, "  the  fountains  of  the  great 
deep  were  broken  up,"  indicates  that  all  the  waters  of  the 
globe,  wherever  those  vast  liquid  stores  lay,  were  lifted  and 
made  to  overspread  the  previously  dry  portions  of  the  earth. 
We  are  not  necessitated  to  entertain  that  unphilosophical  no- 
tion of  many  of  the  old  writers,  that  the  phrase  "  fountains  of 
the  great  deep  "  denotes  a  vast  ocean  or  numerous  minor  but 
very  large  bodies  of  water  situated  in  the  interior  of  the 
earth ;  and  the  event  predicated  of  them  to  mean  the  belching 
out  of  these  upon  the  before  desiccate  surface.  The  phrase- 
ology is  adapted  to  popular  impressions  on  the  subject,  and 
imports  in  general  that  the  waters  issued  from  their  ocean- 
beds,  and  other  terrestrial  repositories,  and  overspread  the  in- 
habited dry  land. 

It  utterly  and  immeasurably  surpasses  all  possibility  for 
the  human  mind,  in  its  extremest  stretch,  to  conceive  of  the 
stupendousness  as  well  as  fearfulness  of  the  occurrence  so 
summarily  but  sublimely  stated  in  Gen.  7:  11.  We  shall 
act  more  wisely  and  profitably,  young  gentlemen,  in  contem- 
plating it  with  wonder  and  awe,  than  by  the  labored  employ 
of  a  multitude  of  words  in  bootless  efforts  to  explain  it. 

There  is  specific  mention  made,  by  the  prime  historian, 
of  the  period  of  the  year  when  the  Noachian  Flood  com- 
menced, (ch.  7  :  11)  ;  but  as  the  year  began  differently  in 
Noah's  and  in  Moses'  time  from  what  it  does  in  ours,  perhaps 
you  may  not  all  feel  prepared  at  once  to  say  to  what  part 
exactly  of  our  year  "  the  second  month  and  seventeenth  day  of 
the  month  "  of  the  sacred  historian,  corresponds.  Who  among 
you  will  volunteer  an  opinion  ?  If  you  all  are  too  modest, 
the  speaker  must  offer  one.  The  Israelites  had  their  ecclesi- 
astical or  sacred  year,  and  their  civil  year.  The  former  com- 
menced with  the  month  Nisan,  alias  Abib,  agreeing  with 
parts  of  March  and  April.  The  latter,  which  alone  prevailed 
among  them  prior  to  their  departure  from  Egypt,  began  with 
Tisri  —  which,  according  to  what  may  perhaps  be  accounted 


104  CIRCUMSTANCES  RECOUNTED. 

the  best  authorities,  commenced  about  the  time  of  the 
autumnal  equinox,  i.  e.  about  the  20th  of  September.  The 
"  seventeenth  day  of  the  second  month  "  (Marchesvan)  would 
accordingly  correspond  with  our  6th  of  November. 

On  that  day  the  rain  began  to  fall,  which  continued  falling 
for  forty  days  and  nights  in  succession,  (12th  verse,)  that  is? 
until  the  16th  of  December.  At  the  same  time  the  earth's 
watery  treasures  began  to  move  from  their  accustomed  repos- 
itories, in  order  to  the  accomplishment  of  the  fearful  deter- 
mination of  the  Deity. 

At  the  end  of  one  hundred  and  fifty  days,  (five  months 
from  the  commencement  of  the  Deluge,)  the  ark,  on  the 
7th  month  and  17th  day  of  the  month,  found  some  sort 
of  repose.  On  the  10th  month  and  1st  day  of  the  month, 
the  mountain  tops  became  visible.  On  the  llth  month  and 
llth  day  of  the  month,  the  raven  was  sent  forth.  On  the 
18th,  and  again  on  the  25th  of  the  same  month,  the  dove  was 
sent  out,  which  returned.  On  the  12th  month,  and  2d  day  of 
the  month,  the  dove  was  again  sent  out,  which  returned  not. 
On  the  601st  year,  that  is,  of  Noah's  age,  the  1st  month  and 
1st  day  of  the  month,  the  waters  were  dried  up  from  off  the 
surface,  —  the  body  of  the  earth  still  being  saturated  with 
water.  On  the  2d  month  of  the  last  mentioned  year,  and 
27th  day  of  the  month,  the  ground  being  fully  dried,  Noah 
and  family  made  their  egress  from  the  ark.  The  aggregate 
period  that  these  were  in  the  floating  vessel  you  thus  perceive 
to  have  been  one  year  and  ten  days.  If  the  seven  days  of 
preparatory  arrangement,  immediately  preceding  the  com- 
mencing rain's  descent,  be  included,  then  the  whole  time 
would  be  a  year  and  seventeen  days. 

And  did  not  those  seven  days  discourse  so  eloquently  of 
the  nearing  judgment  of  God,  and  of  the  fearful  perils  of  the 
ungodly,  as  to  move  at  least  some  of  them  to  cry  for  mercy 
and  earnestly  seek  protection  ?  "Whilst  the  solemn  and 
striking  spectacle  of  the  animals  in  succession,  and  then  of 


THE    UNGODLY    HOW   AFFECTED.  105 

the  Noachic  family,  passing  into  the  ark  was  presented  to 
their  gaze,  was  no  salutary  impression  produced  on  the 
superlatively  wicked  multitude  who  witnessed  it  ?  It  would 
seem  not,  —  not  the  least.  Or  if  any  of  the  crowd  began  to 
feel  some  qualms  of  conscience,  or  some  misgiving  apprehen- 
sions, these  were  too  slight,  or  too  late,  to  be  of  any  avail  for 
their  succor.  "And  the  Lord  shut  him  in,"  (ch.  7  :  16).  Af- 
ter the  waters  had  actually  commenced  rushing  from  their 
aerial  and  earthly  repositories,  numbers  for  the  moment  might 
have  crowded  toward  the  rising  vessel,  importunate  for  that 
admission  which  they  had  before  slighted.  But  —  too  late  ! 
An  immovable  barricade  forbade  all  farther  ingress.  And 
the  rapidly  rising,  rushing  tide  would  allow  but  an  awful 
shriek,  and  all  is  over  ! 

If  the  advance  of  the  commencing  flood  was  slow  enough 
to  admit  of  it,  then  those  deeply  solemn  and  affecting  scenes 
would  have  been  witnessed,  descriptions  of  which  have  prob- 
ably fallen  under  your  notice  —  of  animals  and  men  in  the 
various  localities,  the  numerous  and  widely  extended  portions 
of  the  globe  where  they  dwelt,  fleeing  in  awful  affright 
and  dismay  to  high  and  still  higher  eminences  for  safety  or 
escape,  as  the  rising,  threatening  tide  in  altitude  progressed. 
Here  are  a  few  descriptive  touches  of  the  kind  alluded  to  : 
"  The  various  tribes  of  creatures  were  driven,  day  by  day 
from  one  resource  to  another,  until  none  was  left.  The  men 
who  hoped  that  the  waters  would  soon  subside,  or  whose  re- 
treat from  their  towns  and  villages  was  cut  off  by  the  sur- 
rounding waters,  may  be  conceived  to  have  retreated  to  the 
towers  and  the  trees,  watching  with  horror  the  gradual  rise  of 
the  waters,  and  dropping  off,  one  by  one,  in  fatigue  and  want, 
from  the  extremest  boughs  into  the  encroaching  flood,  even 
before  its  waters  reached  them.  For  those  who  retreated 
to  the  high  lands,  there  was  even  a  more  terrible  lot 
than  for  those  whom  the  waters  soonest  slew.  Thousands, 
who  had  succeeded  in  reaching  the  mountains,  must  have 


106  THE   MELANCHOLY    SCENE. 

perished  with  hunger,  even  before  the  waters  swept  off  the 
miserable  remnant  of  their  numbers.  With  them,  how  soon 
did  the  joy  of  escape  to  a  station  of  fancied  safety  from  the 
waters,  give  place  to  the  consciousness  that  they  were  without 
food  or  the  means  of  obtaining  any,  upon  the  mountains,  and 
must  speedily  perish  there  unless  the  waters  soon  subsided. 
But  they  did  not  subside.  They  rose ;  and,  in  their  rise, 
narrowed,  day  by  day,  the  area  of  possible  existence.  The 
young  and  tender  died  —  the  aged  died  —  men  in  their 
strength  died  —  till  at  last,  some  sole  survivor,  who  had  seen 
all  the  dear  companions  of  his  prime  perish  before  his  eyes, 
stood  alone  upon  the  mountain,  and  rushed  to  meet  the  flood  in 
his  frenzy,  or  sunk  into  it  in  the  listlessness  of  his  despair." 

If  the  waters  of  the  deluge  did  rise  slowly  —  and  the 
period  which  the  history  allows  for  them  to  reach  their  cul- 
minating point  affords  a  plausible  ground  for  the  belief  that  they 
did  —  then  this  picture  is  not  overdrawn.  Then  the  horrors 
of  the  scene  or  scenes  presented  immeasurably  surpass  all 
power  of  description.  And  if,  indeed,  on  the  other  hand,  as 
others  believe,  the  tide  rose  with  such  rapidity  or  suddenness, 
as  almost  instantaneously  to  render  all  flight  to  fancied  places 
of  security  impossible  —  then,  too,  it  is  not  in  the  power  of 
words  to  convey  an  adequate  description  of  the  terrors  of 
the  scene.  Then  what  countless  simultaneous  death-struggles ; 
then  what  an  aggregated,  measureless,  horrific  death-groan  of 
an  expiring  world !  Had  you  a  sufficiently  broad-sweeping 
vision  to  survey  at  a  glance  the  globe,  we  might  ask  you  to 
tell  us,  where,  among  the  countless  myriads  of  previously 
living  things  overspreading  the  earth,  there  is  to  be  discovered, 
outside  barely  of  the  Noaehic  receptacle,  one,  one,  retaining 
life.  Sunk  beneath  the  mighty  waters,  all !  From  his  ark 
our  second  father  looks  out  upon  universal  desolation  !  Sin 
and  unbelief — what  have  ye  done  ?  God  is  just !  Ay,  and 
merciful  too  —  merciful  to  them  that  believe !  They  find 
safety  —  ride  securely  over  the  billowy  deep !  Behold  the 


THE  PATRIARCH'S  EMOTIONS.  107 

* 

goodness  and  severity  of  God  !  Is  sin  a  small  evil  ?  Is  un- 
belief a  safe  one  ?  "  And  to  whom  sware  he  that  they  should 
not  enter  into  his  rest  but  to  them  that  believed  not  ?  So  we 
see  that  they  could  not  enter  in  because  of  unbelief."  Let 
them  fear  and  repudiate  it  who  would  not  perish.  Is  faith  or 
piety  a  vain  thing  ?  What  else  put  and  preserved  that  son 
of  Lamech  in  the  floating  vessel  ?  And  what  else  puts  any 
human  souls  in  heaven  ? 

Can  we,  young  gentlemen,  barely  cast  our  eye  over  the  brief 
simple  narrative  of  that  vast  diluvial  destruction  of  life,  with  a 
heart  void  of  welling  emotion  ?  And  think  you  that  our 
patriarch  could  have  been  an  eyewitness,  as  it  were,  of  the 
wide  death-struggle,  and  heard  the  groans  and  shrieks  of  a 
dying  world  —  a  simultaneous  sighing  out  of  universal  life  — 
with  no  stirring  impulses  ?  —  especially,  when,  among  that 
innumerable  throng  crowding  the  gates  of  death,  were  not  a 
few  near  relatives  of  his  own ;  probably,  as  we  have  formerly 
hinted,  even  a  considerable  number  of  his  own  earlier  born 
sons  and  daughters  !  At  the  same  time  we  cannot  say  that 
there  was  in  his  soul  any  warring  against  the  administration 
of  the  Universal  Sovereign.  His  language,  doubtless,  over 
the  boundless  desolation  wa?,  "  Righteous  art  thou,  O  Lord, 
and  upright  are  thy  judgments." 

You,  no  doubt,  as  well  as  myself,  have  witnessed  in  certain 
quarters,  wondrous  ebullitions  of  sympathy  and  commiseration 
for  the  destroyed ;  and  heard  from  their  lips  exclamations  of 
amazement  at  the  reported  conduct  of  the  Destroyer.  They 
cannot  reconcile  such  a  procedure  with  the  ideas  they  have 
been  accustomed  to  entertain  of  the  Supreme  Being.  What 
wonderful  concern  for  his  honor !  And  several  of  these 
sympathetic  and  compassionate  souls  are  so  staggered  at, 
that  they  absolutely  cannot  be  so  weak  or  credulous  as  to  be- 
lieve the  alleged  history,  in  which  this  so-called  narrative  is 
contained,  to  be  true.  Their  reason  and  all  their  better  im- 
pulses compel  them  to  think  either  that  Moses  did  not  write 


108  INFIDEL  CAVIL. 

this  story,  or  else  that  he  was  somehow  deceived,  and  under 
this  deception  was  led  to  ascribe  to  the  Almighty's  agency 
what  he  had  naught  to  do  with ;  or,  that  the  writer  had  been 
misinformed  in  regard  to  an  event,  which,  though  related  to 
him  as  having  occurred  in  the  time  of  his  predecessors,  yet 
never  happened,  at  least  except  in  a  very  circumscribed  de- 
gree ;  —  a  very  limited  inundation,  such  as  has  often  occurred 
since  those  early  times  ! 

Now  we  shall  not  turn  apologists  for  God  ;  —  he  needs  no 
apology  for  his  conduct  from  us ;  is  fully  able  to  sustain  his 
own  honor,  vindicate  his  own  character.  Nor  are  our  kind 
offices  vastly  needed  to  maintain  the  correctness  of  Moses' 
knowledge  or  statements.  We  would  prefer  commending  to 
scoffers  and  skeptics  to  read  the  Bible  a  good  deal  more  than 
they  have  ever  yet  done  ;  and  with  more  of  a  modicum  of  the 
candor  that  they  have  ever  yet  brought  to  the  perusal  of  our 
Sacred  Book.  And  if  any  superaddition,  in  the  way  of 
counsel,  be  requisite,  wo  would  recommend  to  them  the  ex- 
amination of  some  of  the  more  able  of  the  many  treatises  on 
the  Evidences  of  the  Authenticity  and  Inspiration  of  the 
Holy  Scriptures  ;  of  both  which — we  mean  the  Scriptures 
and  the  Treatises  —  they  may  safely  be  affirmed  to  be  dis- 
creditably ignorant. 

Cavillers  have  appeared  to  be  particularly  distressed  at 
the  thought,  that  young  children,  who  confessedly  had  done 
no  evil,  should,  and  in  such  vast  numbers  too,  be  cut  off 
along  with  the  adult  population.  Now  to  this,  a  word  in 
response.  "  All  souls  are  mine,"  says  God  ;  and  if  he  choose 
to  take  any  to  himself  ere  they  have  made  a  long  tarry  in  the 
body,  no  one  has  any  right  to  find  fault.  The  children 
alluded  to  were  very  kindly  dealt  with  in  being  exalted  to 
the  divine  abode,  in  lieu  of  being  left  to  grow  up  under 
deleterious  and  ruinous  parental  and  social  influences,  such 
as  they  would  have  risen  up  from  childhood  to  maturity 
under,  had  no  deluge  occurred.  Besides  :  More  than  a  sin- 


THE   DISPENSATION    NOT    UNRIGHTEOUS.  109 

gle  miracle  would  have  been  requisite  to  preserve  the  infantile 
whilst  the  adult  population  were  destroyed;  and  to  sustain 
them  through  childhood  and  adolescence,  without  human 
adult  instrumentalities  employed  in  their  sustentation.  The 
removal  of  such  a  number  in  the  dawn  of  being,  though  from 
the  prison  to  the  palace,  was  indeed  an  administrative  act 
solemn  in  its  character.  But  let  not  God  be  charged  fool- 
ishly. To  us  or  others  no  great  share  of  mental  discernment 
can  be  justly  attributed,  if  we  or  they  cannot  discover  wisdom 
and  benevolence  to  have  been  prominent  qualities  of  the  dis- 
pensation. No,  no.  The  broad  besom  of  Omnipotence  did 
not  sweep  the  world  of  its  entire  living  tenantry,  causelessly, 
wantonly.  "  Shall  not  the  Judge  of  all  the  earth  do  right  ?  " 
Nor,  as  we  may  well  believe,  was  this  thing  done  without  a 
great  struggle  first,  in  the  heart  of  God,  between  Justice  and 
Mercy.  The  occurrence,  viewed  as  an  act  of  divine  admin- 
istration, would  have  worn  a  very  different  aspect,  had  no  in- 
timation or  warning  been  beforehand  given  to  the  guilty 
population  of  the  globe,  of  Jehovah's  displeasure  with  their 
wickedness,  together  with  his  intention  to  destroy  them,  and 
at  such  a  specific  period,  unless  by  repentance  and  reforma- 
tion they  should  avert  the  doom.  We  have  heard  how 
assiduous  and  faithful  was  God's  servant  Noah,  in  instructing, 
remonstrating  with,  and  warning  the  people.  And  whose 
fault  was  it  but  their  own,  if  they  did  not  profit  by  the  min- 
istrations ?  Nor  do  we  feel  disposed  peremptorily  to  declare 
that  absolutely  all  did  fail  in  this  particular.  In  the  interval 
of  one  hundred  and  twenty  years,  whilst  many  must  have 
died,  may  not  some  of  that  number  have  been  deeply,  and  to 
themselves  advantageously,  impressed  by  what  of  truth  and 
counsel  fell  from  the  lips  of  the  "  preacher  of  righteousness," 
and  by  the  threatened  judgments  of  an  offended  God  ? 


EVENING   EIGHTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

You  will  have  no  objection,  we  suppose,  to  hear  the  form  of 
prayer  which  Noah  is  said  to  have  used  whilst  he  and  his  fam- 
ily were  tenanting  the  ark.  It  is  not  necessary  to  say,  that  it 
was  not  sent  down  to  us  by  Noah ;  and  that  Moses  has  left 
no  statement  about  it ;  but  —  "  some  Oriental  writers."  How 
they  knew  just  after  what  manner  he  prayed,  or  exactly  what 
words  he  employed,  you  will  excuse  us  from  telling  you,  for  a 
reason  which  you  will  deem  satisfactory :  because  we  do  not 
know,  and  have  no  means  of  knowing.  The  form  runs  thus : 
"  O  Lord,  thou  art  truly  great,  and  there  is  nothing  so  great 
as  that  it  can  be  compared  to  thee.  Look  upon  us  with  an 
eye  of  mercy,  and  deliver  us  from  the  deluge  of  waters.  I 
entreat  this  of  thee  for  the  love  of  Adam,  the  first  man ;  for 
the  love  of  Abel,  thy  saint ;  for  the  righteousness  of  Seth, 
whom  thou  hast  loved.  Let  us  not  be  reckoned  in  the  num- 
ber of  those  who  have  disobeyed  thy  commandments ;  but  still 
extend  thy  merciful  care  to  us,  because  thou  hast  hitherto  been 
our  deliverer,  and  all  thy  creatures  shall  declare  thy  praise. 
Amen."  It  is  brief,  you  see,  and  has  in  it  a  measure  of 
appropriateness.  Many  have  not  been  so  felicitous  in  the 
choice  of  words.  Noah,  who  had  "walked  with  God"  before 
the  deluge,  no  doubt  was  engaged  much  in  directly  devotional 
exercise  during  its  prevalence,  and  whilst  in  his  floating 


NOAH    HOW    OCCUPIED    IN   THE   ARX.  Ill 

house ;  but  as,  under  the  circumstances,  his  heart  must  have 
been  so  full  of  emotion,  as  well  as  his  intellect  of  thought,  and 
as  out  of  the  abundance  of  the  heart  the  mouth  speaketh,  it 
is  very  improbable  that  he  confined  himself  to  any  such  sum- 
mary form  of  prayer ;  and,  not  less  so,  that  he  offered  suppli- 
cation unto  God,  and  asked  for  mercy  and  safe  deliverance, 
only  for  the  love  of  Adam  and  Abel,  and  for  the  righteousness 
of  Seth. 

Think,  young  gentlemen,  of  the  strange  situation,  for  a 
year  and  more,  in  which  this  man  of  God  was  placed.  How 
much  to  arouse  his  mind  and  move  his  heart !  If  he  had  not 
crowds  of  great  and  solemn  thoughts,  and  warm  and  big 
emotions,  he  then  was  not  the  man  we  take  him  to  have 
been.  If  our  patriarch  had  been  a  very  good,  but  a  weak 
man  —  one  of  small  mental  calibre,  or  destitute  of  the  quali- 
ties in  general  which  constitute  what  may  be  called  a  great 
and  efficient  man  —  it  is  reasonable  to  think,  that  God  would 
have  never  committed  or  entrusted  so  much,  and  matters  of 
unspeakable  moment  pertaining  both  to  the  Old  and  New 
World,  to  his  execution,  care,  or  management.  Among  the 
numerous  themes  which  would  naturally  occupy  the  great 
mind  of  such  a  man,  whilst  in  his  big  vessel,  upon  the  wide, 
watery  waste,  would  be  the  amazing  greatness,  power,  wis- 
dom, holiness,  justice  of  God  ;  the  character  and  practices  of 
the  population  of  the  Old  World ;  the  evil  and  demerit  of 
sin ;  the  state  of  the  recently  living  millions  of  the  globe, 
and  what  must  ensue  to  them  whilst  traversing  the  long  line 
of  a  future  interminable  being ;  together  with  the  amazingly, 
unaccountably  distinguishing  providential  and  gracious  conduct 
of  the  Lord  Almighty  toward  himself  and  the  seven  others 
—  the  sole  survivors  of  the  myriads  of  Adam's  progeny  — 
sheltered  from  even  the  fear  of  evil.  And  in  conjunction 
with  or  as  immediate  sequences  of  such  thoughts,  what  fervid 
and  expanded  feelings  must  have  come  thickly  looming  up 
from  his  inmost  soul. 


112  THE    EIGHT    WHY   PRESERVED. 

Wide  of  the  truth  in  our  conceptions  would  we  get,  were 
we  to  conceive  that  the  second  father  of  our  race  found  his 
life,  whilst  in  the  floating  house,  a  dull,  stagnant  one.  Besides 
the  interesting  and  busy  occupation  which  his  soul  in  all  its 
faculties  found  whilst  a  moving  dweller  on  the  mighty  deep 

—  besides  the  abundant  intellectual  and  emotional  products 
to  which  it  gave  birth  —  the  physical  man  was  not  exempt 
from  all  occasion  for  the  taxing  of  its  energies,  or  the  putting 
forth  of  its  activities ;  and  this  not  in  the  case  of  Noah  ex- 
clusively, but  of  the  whole  family.     The  appetites  and  what 
pertained  to  the  health  and  comfort  of  subhuman  cotenants 

—  bird,  beast,  reptile  —  would  make  such  demands,  neces- 
sarily, on  other  than  the  mental  powers,  that  there  was  no 
danger  of  time  hanging  heavy  on  their  hands,  or  appearing 
to  move  sluggishly.     Busy  hands  make  busy  wings. 

Bather  a  mysterious  or  strange  proceeding  it  may  to  some 
appear,  that  the  Infinite  King  should  have  chosen  to  remove 
all  of  mankind,  except  eight  persons,  from  the  earth,  and  yet 
not  the  whole.  As  the  Omnipotent  could  so  easily  have 
created  an  entirely  new  and  holy  race  of  intelligent  beings, 
why  did  he  not  choose  to  remove  all  of  the  apostate  family  of 
man,  in  preference  to  what  he  did  ?  It  would,  as  one  of  the 
apparently  least  benefits  resulting  from  it,  have  saved  that 
vast  expenditure  of  time,  property,  and  labor  incurred  in  the 
construction  of  the  ark,  and  the  replenishing  of  it  with,  and 
the  support  for  so  considerable  a  period  of  its  numerous 
animal  tenantry.  As  for  Noah  and  any  members  of  his 
household  that  were  pious,  these,  it  might  be  said,  could,  by 
the  Sovereign  Disposer,  have  been  transferred  from  this  low, 
dark  vale,  to  glory's  lustrous  summits,  immediately  before  the 
submerging  judgment  was  caused  to  visit  the  globe. 

Jehovah  could  indeed,  without  any  great  draught  on  his 
almightiness,  have  brought  into  existence  a  new  and  holy 
race  in  the  room  of  the  apostate  and  corrupt  species  of 
creatures  which  had  so  failed  to  answer  the  great  end  for 


GENESIS   REAL   HISTORY.  113 

which  God's  fingers  formed  them  ;  but  there  was  no  greater 
reason  why  he  should  have  taken  this  course  now,  than 
immediately  subsequent  to  our  first  parents'  fall.  Besides, 
he  had  early  committed  himself  against  this  course.  The 
fulfilment  of  the  First  Promise  would  forbid  the  destruc- 

\ 

tion  of  the  entire  human  race.  The  purposed  manifestation 
of  certain  features  of  his  own  infinitely  glorious  character, 
moreover,  would  preclude  it.  Neither  in  our  first  nor  second 
father's  time  would  God  suffer  Satan  utterly  to  defeat  his 
great  end  in  bringing  into  existence  mankind.  It  may  also 
be  added  that  Infinite  Wisdom  preferred  taking  advantage  of 
the  stock  of  knowledge  and  experience  of  our  patriarch  in 
the  founding  of  a  new  world. 

As  the  Biblical  account  of  the  Noachic  cataclysm  is  be- 
fore you,  there  is  no  call  for  a  rehearsal  of  all  the  particulars, 
relative  to  this  memorable  occurrence,  which  are  there  given. 
But,  says  growing  and  emboldened  incredulity,  Did  an  event, 
corresponding  in  all  its  features  with  this  account,  ever  occur  ? 
There  are,  perhaps,  greater  numbers  in  our  day  than  there 
have  been  in  any  preceding  age,  who  seem  not  backward 
about  saying,  in  reply  to  such  a  question,  No.  This  is  in 
substance  a  denial,  either  that  Moses  wrote  this  account ;  that 
he  was  a  credible  and  inspired  writer ;  or,  that  he  meant  the 
first  eight  or  ten  chapters  of  Genesis  to  be  taken  in  the  light 
of  literal  history.  This  leads  us  to  remark,  in  reference  to 
the  part  of  the  Bible  now  before  us,  what  we  have  previously 
said  in  relation  to  the  entire  Book,  —  that,  as  you  did  not,  at 
the  outset,  prefer  such  a  request,  so  we  cannot  consent  to 
pause  in  our  prescribed  course,  to  deliver  a  series  of  lectures 
in  proof  of  these  several  points.  Nor,  as  the  evidences  in  re- 
gard to  these  are  so  ably  and  amply  presented  in  numerous 
accessible  works,  is  such  a  thing  at  all  requisite.  That  the 
writer  of  the  earlier  chapters  of  Genesis  intended  what  he 
wrote  to  be  understood  in  the  light  of  myth,  allegory,  or  poetry, 
common  sense,  to  say  nothing  more,  rejects  the  idea.  Dog- 


114  REMARKS    ON   RIGHT   INTERPRETATION. 

matic  as  to  some, — not  to  you,  —  it  may  appear,  we  are  willing 
with  confidence  to  aver,  that  the  scribe  who  drafted  that  doc- 
ument designed  to  throw  from  his  pen  naught  other  than  plain, 
unsophisticated,  sober  history.  Figurative  phraseology  is 
indeed  not  wholly  abstained  from  ;  and  a  speaking  according 
to  appearances,  instead  of  philosophically  or  scientifically,  we 
find.  It  should  not,  we  think,  be  regarded  as  inconsonant 
with  the  honor  of  God's  word,  that  its  references  to  natural 
objects  should  be,  in  the  character  of  thought  and  expression, 
such  as  comported  with  the  conceptions,  impressions,  grade 
of  knowledge,  of  the  age  in  which  they  are  delivered.  The 
Sacred  Scriptures  deal  not  in  scientific  or  logical  distinctions 
or  rigid  definitions.  They  were  addressed  to  the  heart  and 
understanding  in  popular  forms  of  speech,  such  as  the  mass 
of  men  could  readily  comprehend.  Thus  the  sun  is  spoken 
of  as  rising  and  setting  ;  and  when  language  of  this  sort  is 
met  with,  we,  of  this  age,  do  not  suppose  it  to  be  used  with 
astronomical  correctness,  but  only  according  to  appearances. 
The  great  object  of  Scripture  being  to  teach  the  world  reli- 
gious truth,  not  to  serve  as  a  text-book  of  science,  the  lan- 
guage employed  to  describe  natural  phenomena  must  have 
been  adapted  to  the  state  of  knowledge  among  the  people  to 
whom  the  Scripture  was  addressed.  You  perceive  then  how 
there  may  occur  instances  of  apparent  contradiction  between 
the  statements  of  Science  and  Revelation.  The  latter  may 
describe  phenomena  according  to  apparent  truth  ;  whilst  the 
former  describes  the  same  according  to  the  actual  truth.  Had 
the  language  of  Revelation  been  scientifically  accurate,  it 
would  have  defeated  the  object  for  which  the  Scriptures  were 
given ;  for  it  must  have  anticipated  scientific  discovery,  and 
therefore  have  been  unintelligible  to  those  ignorant  of  such 
discoveries.  Or,  if  these  had  been  explained  by  Inspiration, 
the  Bible  would  have  become  a  text-book  in  physical  science, 
rather  than  a  guide  to  duty  and  eternal  life.  Since,  then, 
Science  and  Revelation  treat  of  the  same  subjects  but  inci- 


TRADITIONAL    EVIDENCE    OF   THE   DELUGE.  115 

dentally,  "  we  ought,"  as  the  respected  author  of  the  "Reli- 
gion of  Geology "  observes, "  only  to  expect  that  the  facts 
of  science,  rightly  understood,  should  not  contradict  the 
statements  of  revelation,  correctly  interpreted"  It  is,  young 
gentlemen,  too  much  to  expect  of  finite,  fallible  humanity, 
that  all  misconception  or  misinterpretation  of  every  thing, 
either  in  the  department  of  nature  or  of  Scripture,  should  have 
been  wholly  avoided ;  and  equally  too  much  to  expect  that  it 
will  all  speedily  end.  There  are  men  —  we  would  say  it 
kindly  —  who  are  exceedingly  tenacious  of  the  opinions  they 
have  embraced,  however  hastily,  from  how  insufficient  exam- 
ination or  data  soever  these  opinions  have  been  formed.  The 
men  alluded  to,  act  or  feel,  in  reference  to  said  opinions,  as  if 
they  were  infallible,  —  could  not  possibly  have  fallen  into  a 
mistake.  There  will  be,  especially  with  some  of  these  men,  a 
very  tardy  abandonment  of  confidence  in  their  infallibility. 
Hence  we  look  for  the  clashing  of  arms,  the  maintenance  of 
conflict  between  portions  of  the  interpreters  or  rather  misin- 
terpreters  referred  to,  not  wholly  to  subside  for  some  time  to 
come.  But  this  digression  has  been  extended  beyond  what 
was  designed. 

If  the  Bible  contain  a  divine  revelation,  —  a  thing  which 
we  fully,  firmly,  and,  as  we  think,  on  thoroughly  examined 
evidence,  believe,  —  then  its  statements  —  its  correctly  un- 
derstood, rightly  interpreted  statements  —  need  no  confirma- 
tion from  extraneous  or  foreign  sources  ;  from  natural  or  from 
traditional  utterances.  Yet  it  is  possible  for  our  confidence  in 
the  correctness  of  our  interpretation  of  a  scriptural  document 
or  statement,  to  receive  confirmation  or  strength,  when  na- 
ture's or  tradition's  testimony  is  of  like  import  with  it. 

If  such  a  remarkable  event  did  transpire  as  that  of  the 
scripturally  reported  Noachian  Deluge,  although  the  number 
surviving  the  catastrophe,  to  transmit  it,  was  small,  yet  we 
would  naturally  expect  that  some  notices  of  it  would,  by 


116  TRADITIONAL    EVIDENCE    OF   THE    DELUOE. 

tradition  or  orally,  be  handed  down  from  one  generation  to 
another,  and  more  or  less  extend  to  different  portions  of  the 
descendants  of  the  Noachic  family.  And  so  we  find  it. 
Traditions  there  are  existing,  in  various,  not  only  contiguous, 
but  widely  distant,  nations  of  the  globe,  more  or  less  distinct, 
relating  to  this  stupendous  physical  occurrence  —  this  unpar- 
alleled and  marvellous  inundation.  We  say,  relating  to  this; 
for,  upon  their  presentation,  you  will  be  able  to  trace  such 
features  as  will  leave  your  mind  in  no  dubiety  as  to  their 
primary  derivation,  or  appropriate  reference.  You  will 
observe,  —  a  thing  which  we  would  naturally  expect, — that 
these  traditions  mostly  partake  less  and  less  of  distinctness, 
in  proportion  as  we  recede  from  the  quarter  of  the  world 
where  the  ark  rested.  But,  in  giving  an  abstract  of  these 
traditions,  it  is  difficult  to  decide  where  it  is  best  to  begin. 
This,  however,  is,  perha'ps,  a  matter  of  no  great  moment. 

Our  mind  runs,  naturally,  first  to  the  Orient,  there  being 
the  theatre  of  those  particular  occurrences  specified  by  the 
inspired  narrator,  respecting  the  deluge.  Suppose  we  com- 
mence with  Chaldea.  The  tradition  of  that  country  runs 
thus:  —  "The  god  Chronus  appeared  to  Xisuthrus  in  a 
vision,  and  warned  him,  that,  on  the  fifteenth  day  of  the 
month  Daesius,  there  would  occur  an  inundation,  by  which 
the  race  of  man  would  be  destroyed.  He  therefore  ordered 
him  to  build  a  vessel,  and  into  it  to  take  with  him  his  friends 
and  connections ;  and  to  convey  every  thing  essential  to  the 
sustaining  of  life  on  board ;  together  with  specimens  of  all 
the  different  living  creatures,  birds  and  quadrupeds ;  and  to 
trust  himself  fearlessly  to  the  deep.  In  compliance  with 
these  directions,  Xisuthrus  constructed  a  vessel,  in  length 
five  stadia,  (i.  e.,  about  three-fourths  of  a  mile,)  and  two 
stadia  in  breadth.  Into  this  he  collected  every  thing  he  had 
prepared,  and  last  of  all  entered  it  himself,  with  his  wife, 
children,  and  friends.  After  the  flood  had  been  upon  the 


TRADITIONAL    EVIDENCE    OP    THE   DELUGE.  117 

earth,  and  was  in  time  abated,  Xisuthrus  sent  out  birds  from 
the  vessel,  which,  finding  no  food  or  place  for  rest,  returned 
to  him.  After  the  lapse  of  some  days,  he  sent  them  forth 
again,  and  they  returned  with  their  feet  tinged  with  mud. 
He,  subsequently,  made  with  them  a  third  trial,  and  they 
returned  no  more :  from  which  he  inferred  that  the  surface 
of  the  earth  had  appeared  above  the  waters.  He  according- 
ly made  an  opening  in  the  vessel,  and,  on  looking  out,  found 
that  it  was  stranded  upon  a  mountain,  which  he  afterwards 
ascertained  to  be  in  the  land  of  Armenia."  (See  Cory's 
Ancient  Fragments  for  it  in  full.) 

Berosus,  a  Chaldean  priest,  who  lived  two  hundred  and 
seventy  years  before  Christ,  gathered  from  traditions  exist- 
ing in  his  region  the  following.  After  stating  that  before  the 
flood  there  was  a  great  city  of  giants,  called  Aeno,  situated 
near  Libanus,  who  governed  the  whole  world,  his  account  pro- 
ceeds thus  :  "  There  was  one  among  the  giants  who  reverenced 
the  gods,  and  was  more  wise  and  prudent  than  all  the  rest ; 
his  name  was  Noa  ;  he  dwelt  in  Syria,  with  his  three  sons, 
Sem,  Japet,  Cham,  and  their  wives,  the  great  Tidea,  Pandora, 
Noea  and  Noegla.  This  man,  fearing  the  destruction  which 
he  foresaw  from  the  stars  would  come  to  pass,  began  in  the 
seventy-eighth  year  before  the  inundation,  to  build  a  ship 
covered  like  an  ark.  Seventy-eight  years  from  the  time  he 
began  to  build  this  ship,  the  ocean  of  a  sudden  broke  out, 
and  all  the  inland  seas  and  the  rivers  and  fountains  bursting 
from  beneath,  (attended  with  the  most  violent  rains  from 
heaven  for  many  days,)  overflowed  all  the  mountains ;  so 
that  the  whole  human  race  was  buried  in  the  waters,  except 
Noa  and  his  family,  who  were  saved  by  means  of  the  ship  ; 
which  being  lifted  up  by  the  waters,  rested  at  last  upon  the 
top  of  the  Glordyaean  mountain,  of  which  it  is  reported,  there 
now  remaineth  some  part,  and  that  men  take  away  the  bitu- 
men from  it,  and  make  use  of  it  by  way  of  a  charm,  or  expia- 
6* 


118  TRADITIONAL    EVIDENCE    OF   THE    DELUGE. 

tion  to  avert  evil.  We  must  therefore  allow  from  these 
premises,  that  which  both  the  Chaldeans  and  Scythians  write 
of,  that  after  the  earth  was  dried  from  the  waters,  there  were 
no  more  than  the  above  mentioned  eight  persons  in  Armenia, 
and  that  from  these  all  men  upon  earth  sprung ;  and  for  this 
reason  it  is,  that  the  Scythians  justly  call  Noa  the  father  of 
all  the  greater  and  lesser  gods,  the  author  of  the  human  race, 
the  chaos,  and  seed  of  the  world." 

Among  the  ancient  Persians  was  likewise  found  the  tradi- 
tion of  a  general  deluge.  Alluded  to  only  wildly  is  the 
subject  in  the  Zendavesta ;  but  among  the  ancient  books  of 
the  Parsees  —  who  inherit  the  worship  and  notions  of  the 
ancient  Persians  —  is  one  which  states  that  the  world  having 
been  corrupted  by  Ahriman,  the  evil  one,  it  was  thought 
necessary  to  bring  over  the  world  a  universal  flood  of  waters, 
that  all  impurity  might  be  washed  away.  Accordingly  the 
rain  came  down  in  drops  as  large  as  the  head  of  a  bull,  until 
the  earth  was  wholly  covered  with  water  to  the  height  of  a 
man,  and  all  the  khaufaters  (the  creatures  of  the  evil  one) 
perished.  The  waters  then  gradually  subsided,  and  first  the 
mountains  and  then  the  plains  appeared  once  more.  In  this 
tradition  there  is  the  deficiency  of  a  family  preserved  in  an 
ark,  which  we  find  in  even  remoter  regions.  But  it  is  stated 
that  after  the  flood  there  was  a  new  creation  of  men  and 
animals. 

The  ancient  Egyptians  were  manifestly  not  unacquainted 
with  the  doctrine  of  a  general  deluge,  though  the  details  of 
their  belief  have  not  been  transmitted  to  us.  The  Egyptian 
historian  Manetho,  as  quoted  by  Syncellus  and  Eusebius, 
speaks  of  certain  inscribed  pillars,  which  were  set  up  by  the 
Thoth,  the  first  Hermes,  and  the  inscriptions  on  which  were 
after  the  deluge  transcribed  into  books.  Plato  also  states  in 
his  Timceus,  that  having  questioned  a  certain  Egyptian  priest 
on  the  subject,  he  was  informed  that  the  gods,  wishing  to 


TRADITIONAL    EVIDENCE    OF    THE    DELUGE.  119 

purify  the  earth  by  water,  overwhelmed  it  by  a  deluge.  On 
this  occasion  certain  shepherds  and  herdsmen  were  saved 
upon  the  tops  of  the  mountains ;  but  those  who  dwelt  in 
towns  were  swept  away  by  the  rising  waters.  Whether  this 
statement  applied  to  the  general  deluge  might  indeed  admit 
of  doubt,  were  it  not  that  the  religion  of  the  ancient 
Egyptians  abounds  in  Noachic  memorials,  which  fix  the  true 
purport  of  such  statements.  From  another  source  also  we 
gather  the  following :  The  Noah  of  Egypt  appears  to  have 
been  Osiris.  Typhon,  a  personification  of  the  sea,  enticed 
him  into  an  ark,  which  being  closed,  he  was  forced  to  sea ; 
and  it  is  a  curious  fact,  that  he  embarked  on  the  17th  day 
of  the  month  Athyr,  the  very  day,  most  probably,  when 
Noah  entered  the  ark. 

The  famous  tradition  of  Deucalion's  deluge,  as  preserved 
among  the  Greeks,  has  so  close  a  coincidence  with  that  of 
Noah,  that  the  accounts  possessed  by  us  seem  to  read  like 
amplified  reports  of  the  record  in  Genesis.  Philo,  the  Alex- 
andrian Jew,  who  was  well  acquainted  with  both  sacred  and 
pagan  literature,  plainly  affirms  that  Deucalion  was  Noah. 
His  words  (translated)  are,  "  The  Grecians  call  him  Deuca- 
lion, but  the  Chaldeans  style  him  Noah ;  in  whose  time  there 
happened  the  great  eruption  of  waters."  Another  author 
says  (in  Gr.),  "O  Noe  Xisouthros  para  Chaldaios."  Of  this 
deluge  of  Deucalion  we  have  two  accounts  :  one  by  Lucian, 
and  another  by  Ovid.  That  by  the  last  named  is  the  most 
poetical,  as  well  as  the  most  full  in  descriptive  details  ; 
whilst  that  of  the  first  mentioned  is  most  consistently  in 
agreement  with  the  Mosaic  details  throughout.  As  your 
countenances  express  a  desire  to  hear  them,  we  will  present 
you  with  an  abstract  of  each. 

After  giving  an  account  of  the  giants  assailing  heaven  by 
piling  mountains  on  mountains,  and  then  of  the  "  impious, 
arrogant,  and  cruel  brood  "  that  sprung  out  of  the  "  impreg- 


120  TRADITIONAL    EVIDENCE    OF   THE    DELUGE. 

nant  earth  "  from  their  blood,  the   Roman  poet,  Ovid,  pro- 
ceeds (Dry den's  translation)  to  say, 

"  But  Jove 

Concludes  to  pour  a  wat'ry  deluge  down, 
And  what  lie  durst  not  burn,  concludes  to  drown. 

Impetuous  rain  descends ; 
Nor  from  his  patrimonial  heaven  alone 
Is  Jove  content  to  pour  his  vengeance  down  : 
Aid  from  his  brother  of  the  seas  he  craves, 
To  help  him  with  auxiliary  waves. 
Then  with  his  mace  the  monarch  struck  the  ground, 
And  rising  storms  a  ready  passage  found. 
Now  seas  and  earth  were  in  confusion  lost, 
A  world  of  waters  and  without  a  coast. 
A  mountain  of  stupendous  height  there  stands 
Betwixt  the  Athenian  and  Bseotian  lands, 
Parnassus  is  its  name  ;  whose  forky  rise 
Mounts  through  the  clouds  and  mates  the  lofty  skies  ; 
High  on  the  summit  of  this  dubious  cliff, 
Deucalion  wafting  moored  his  little  skiff. 
He  with  his  wife  were  only  left  behind, 
Of  perished  man ;  they  two  were  human  kind  ; 
The  most  upright  of  mortal  man  was  he, 
The  most  sincere  and  holy  woman  she,  — 
When  Jupiter,  surveying  earth  from  high, 
Beheld  it  in  a  lake  of  waters  lie  — 
He  loosed  the  northern  wind  ;  fierce  Boreas  flies 
To  puff  away  the  clouds  and  purge  the  skies." 

[Ovid's  Metam.  lib.  1.] 

Lucian's  account,  which  may  in  distinction  from  the  former 
be  also  called  the  Grecian,  is  on  this  wise :  —  "  The  present 
race  of  mankind  are  different  from  those  who  first  existed ; 
for  those  of  the  antediluvian  world  were  all  destroyed.  The 
present  world  is  peopled  from  the  sons  of  Deucalion ;  having 
increased  to  so  great  a  number  from  one  person.  In  respect 
to  the  former  brood,  they  were  men  of  violence,  and  lawless 
in  their  dealings.  They  regarded  not  oaths,  nor  observed  the 
rites  of  hospitality,  nor  showed  mercy  to  those  who  sued  for. 
it.  On  this  account  they  were  doomed  to  destruction  ;  and, 
for  this  purpose,  there  was  a  mighty  eruption  of  waters  from 


TRADITIONAL    EVIDENCE    OF    THE    DELUGE.  121 

the  earth,  attended  with  heavy  showers  from  above,  so  that 
the  rivers  swelled,  and  the  sea  overflowed,  till  the  whole 
earth  was  covered  with  a  flood,  and  all  flesh  drowned.  Deu- 
calion alone  was  preserved  to  re-people  the  world.  This 
mercy  was  shown  him  on  account  of  his  justice  and  piety. 
His  preservation  was  effected  in  this  manner :  He  put  all  his 
family,  both  his  sons  and  their  wives,  into  a  vast  chest,  (or 
ark,)  which  he  had  provided ;  and  he  went  into  it  himself. 
At  the  same  time  animals  of  every  species,  boars,  horses, 
lions,  serpents,  whatever  lived  upon  the  face  of  the  earth, 
followed  him  by  pairs ;  all  which  he  received  into  the  chest, 
(ark,)  and  experienced  no  evil  from  them.  As  to  what  hap- 
pened after  this,  there  is  an  ancient  tradition  among  those  of 
Hierapolis,  that  in  their  country  a  great  chasm  opened  and 
received  all  the  water;  whereupon  Deucalion  erected  altars 
and  built  the  temple  of  Juno  over  the  chasm."  Thus  far 
from  Lucian.  Plutarch  mentions  that  Deucalion  sent  out  a 
dove  from  the  ark,  whose  return  indicated  a  continuance  of 
the  deluge ;  but  its  neglect  to  return,  when  sent  out  the 
second  time,  or,  as  some  say,  its  return  with  muddy  feet, 
showed  that  the  waters  had  disappeared. 

Analogous  traditions  are  found  scattered  over  the  whole 
peopled  globe.  There  had  been  an  expression  of  some 
doubts  whether  such  a  belief  prevailed  among  the  Chinese. 
But,  says  Sir  William  Jones,  "  I  may  assure  you,  after  full 
inquiry  and  consideration,  that  the  Chinese  believe  the  earth 
to  have  been  wholly  covered  with  water,  which,  in  works  of 
undisputed  authority,  they  describe  as  flowing  abundantly  ? 
then  subsiding,  and  separating  the  higher  from  the  lower 
stage  of  mankind ;  and  that  the  divisions  of  time,  from  which 
their  poetical  history  begins,  just  preceded  the  appearance  of 
Fohi,  (Fohee,)  in  the  mountains  of  China."  (See  Asiatic 
Researches,  vol.  2  :  Dis.  on  Chinese.)  The  antiquities  of  the 
Chinese  reach  no  higher  than  the  times  of  Noah,  for  Fohi 
was  their  first  king.  The  age  of  Fohi  has  been  thought,  by 


122  TRADITIONAL    EVIDENCE    OF    THE    DELUGE. 

some  writers,  to  coincide  with  that  of  Moses'  Noah ;  and 
Shuckford  even  says,  there  are  many  reasons  to  conclude 
Moses'  Noah  and  the  Chinese  Fohi  to  be  the  same  person. 
(See  Shuckford's  Connexions,  vol.  1,  p.  29.)  But  we  must 
postpone  the  further  consideration  of  the  voice  of  tradition  to 
another  evening. 


EVENING   NINTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN  : 

Of  the  Hindoo  tradition  relative  to  the  deluge,  the  follow- 
ing is  Sir  Win.  Jones's  abridged  account,  as  it  is  contained  in 
the  poem  of  the  Bhagavat :  —  "  The  demon  Hayagriva  having 
purloined  the  vedas  from  the  custody  of  Brahma,  while  he 
was  reposing  at  the  close  of  the  sixth  Manwantara,  the  whole 
race  of  men  became  corrupt,  except  the  seven  Bishis,  and 
Satyavrata,  who  then  reigned  in  Drevira,  a  maritime  region 
to  the  south  of  Carnata.  This  prince  was  performing  his 
ablutions  in  the  river  Critamala,  when  Vishnu  appeared  to 
him  in  the  shape  of  a  sm'all  fish ;  and,  after  several  augmen- 
tations of  bulk  in  different  waters,  was  placed  by  Satyavrata 
in  the  ocean,  where  he  thus  addressed  his  amazed  votary : 
'  In  seven  days  all  creatures  who  have  offended  me  shall  be 
destroyed  by  a  deluge ;  but  thou  shalt  be  secured  in  a  capa- 
cious vessel  miraculously  formed.  Take,  therefore,  all  kinds 
of  medicinal  herbs  and  esculent  grain  for  food,  arid,  together 
with  the  seven  holy  men,  your  respective  wives,  and  pairs  of 
all  animals,  enter  the  ark  without  fear;  then  shalt  thou  know 
God  face  to  face,  and  all  thy  questions  shall  be  answered.' 
Saying  this,  he  disappeared ;  and,  after  seven  days,  the  ocean 
began  to  overflow  the  coasts,  and  the  earth  to  be  flooded  by 
constant  showers,  when  Satyavrata,  meditating  on  the  Deity? 


124  TRADITIONAL    EVIDENCE    OP   THE    DELUGE. 

saw  a  large  vessel  moving  on  the  waters.  He  entered  it, 
having  in  all  respects  conformed  to  the  instructions  of 
Vishnu,  who,  in  the  form  of  a  vast  fish,  suffered  the  vessel 
to  be  tied  with  a  great  sea-serpent,  as  with  a  cable,  to  his 
measureless  horn.  "When  the  deluge  had  ceased,  Vishnu 
slew  the  demon,  and  recovered  the  vedas,  instructed  the 
Satyavrata  in  divine  knowledge,  and  appointed  him  the 
seventh  Menu,  by  the  name  of  Vaivaswata."  (Asiatic  Re- 
searches, vol.2;  on  Chronology  of  the  Hindoos.)  "And, 
according  to  the  Pauranias  and  the  followers  of  Buddhu," 
says  Capt.  Wilford,  "the  ark  rested  on  the  mountain  of 
Aryavarta,  Aryawart,  or  India."  (Same  work,  vol.  6,  p. 
521.) 

Some  further  particulars  have  been  given  by  Sir  Wm. 
Jones,  from  the  Hindoo  traditions,  respecting  this  Satyavrata, 
which  present  a  still  more  striking  coincidence  with  the  his- 
tory of  Noah,  subsequent  to  the  deluge.  "  To  Satyavarman, 
that  sovereign  of  the  whole  earth,  were  born  three  sons :  the 
eldest  Sharma ;  then  Charma ; "  (in  the  common  dialect,  ac- 
cording to  Wilford,  pronounced  Sham  and  Cham ;)  "  and  the 
third  Jyapeti  by  name.  They  were  all  men  of  good  morals, 
excellent  in  virtue  and  virtuous  deeds ;  skilled  in  the  use  of 
weapons,  to  strike  with  or  to  be  thrown ;  brave  men,  eager 
for  victory  or  battle.  But  Satyavarman,  being  continually 
delighted  with  devout  meditation,  and  seeing  his  sons  fit  for 
dominion,  laid  upon  them  the  burden  of  government,  while 
he  remained  honoring  and  satisfying  the  gods,  and  priests, 
and  kine.  One  day,  by  the  act  of  destiny,  the  king  having 
drunk  mead,  became  senseless,  and  lay  asleep  naked ;  then 
was  he  seen  by  Charma,  and  by  him  were  his  two  brothers 
called,  to  whom  he  said,  i  What  has  now  befallen  ?  in  what 
state  is  this  our  sire  ? '  By  those  two  was  he  hidden  with 
clothes,  and  called  to  his  senses  again  and  again.  Having 
recovered  his  intellect,  and  perfectly  knowing  what  had 
passed,  he  cursed  Charma,  saying,  '  Thou  shalt  be  the  ser- 


TRADITIONAL    EVIDENCE    OF   THE    DELUGE.  125 

vant  of  servants ;  and,  since  thou  wert  a  laughter  in  their 
presence,  from  laughter  shalt  thou  acquire  a  name/  Then 
he  gave  to  Charma  the  wide  domain  on  the  south  of  the 
snowy  mountains ;  and  to  Jyapeti  he  gave  all  on  the  north 
of  the  snowy  mountains;  but  he,  (Satyavarman,)  by  the 
power  of  religious  contemplation,  attained  supreme  bliss." 
(Vol.  3d  of  Asiatic  Res.) 

Among  the  aboriginal  tribes  of  the  American  Continent, 
even,  exist  traditions  of  the  deluge.  The  Mexicans,  for 
instance,  had  traditions  of  a  flood  which  destroyed  all  the 
human  family  except  one  man  and  his  wife,  who  escaped  in 
the  hollow  trunk  of  an  ahahuete  or  cypress  tree.  The  chil- 
dren born  numerously  to  them,  after  the  subsidence  of  the 
waters,  were  dumb,  until  they  received  the  gift  of  speech 
from  a  dove,  which  came  and  perched  itself  on  a  lofty  tree. 
Humboldt,  in  his  Vues  des  Cordilleras,  informs  us  that  there 
are  Mexican  paintings  of  this  event  extant,  in  which  Coxcox, 
the  Noah  of  the  Mexicans,  and  his  wife,  Xochi quetzal,  are 
seated  in  the  trunk  of  a  tree,  covered  with  leaves,  and  float- 
ing amid  the  waters,  while  Matalcueje  or  Chalchiuhege,  the 
goddess  of  water,  pours  down  her  floods  upon  the  earth.  In 
the  different  representations  of  this  scene,  men  are  seen  swim- 
ming and  perishing  in  the  waters,  and  birds  are  discovered 
fluttering  and  dying  upon  the  surface,  where  they  through 
exhaustion  have  fallen. 

In  Humboldt's  work  just  alluded  to,  there  is  an  allegorical 
painting  (plate  15)  in  which  a  serpent,  cut  asunder,  but  still 
living,  is  seen  shut  up  in  a  tank  of  water,  from  the  midst  of 
which  rises  a  plant.  To  the  left  is  a  woman  crowned  with  a 
garland  ;  while  to  the  right  is  represented  a  man  shut  up  in 
a  kind  of  jar.  A  personage  is  likewise  represented,  to  whose 
victorious  arm  the  miserable  condition  of  the  serpent  is  to  be 
ascribed.  The  allegory  thus  pictured  has  reference,  says 
Humboldt,  to  the  serpent  which  poisoned  the  water  —  the 
source  of  all  organic  life ;  to  the  victory  over  him,  like  that 


126  TRADITIONAL    EVIDENCE    OP   THE    DELUGE. 

of  Krishna  over  the  dragon  Kaliya ;  to  the  seduction  of  the 
world,  and  to  its  purification  by  water.  Here  can  we  fail  to 
trace  the  deluge,  as  well  as  other  prominent  Scripture  inci- 
dents ? 

According  to  Humboldt  and  Herrera,  the  Mechoachans,  a 
people  in  comparative  propinquity  to  the  Mexicans,  believed 
that  mankind,  becoming  forgetful  of  their  origin  and  duties, 
were  punished  by  a  universal  deluge,  from  which  the  priest 
Tezpi,  and  his  wife  and  children,  were  alone  preserved.  He 
shut  himself  up  in  a  large  chest  of  wood,  into  which  he  put 
all  kinds  of  animals  and  all  useful  seeds.  When  the  Great 
Spirit  ordered  the  waters  to  subside,  Tezpi  sent  out  a  bird 
called  aura,  (the  Zopilote,  a  species  of  vulture,)  which,  finding 
food  in  dead  carcasses,  returned ;  then  several  other  birds, 
till  at  length  the  humming  bird  returned  with  a  branch  in 
its  beak. 

The  inhabitants  of  Cuba  related,  "  that  an  old  man,  know- 
ing the  deluge  was  to  come,  built  a  great  ship,  and  went  into 
it,  with  his  family  and  abundance  of  animals  ;  that  he  sent 
out  a  crow,  which  did  not  return  —  staying  to  feed  on  the 
dead  bodies ;  and  afterward  returned  with  a  green  branch  ; "  — 
with  other  particulars,  as  far  as  Noah's  sons  covering  him 
when  drunk,  and  others  scoffing  at  it,  &c.  (See  Herrera's 
History  of  America,  as  quoted  by  Catcott,  p.  72.)  "In 
Peru"  says  Herrera,  in  the  same  work,  " the  ancient  In- 
dians reported  that  they  had  received  by  tradition  from  their 
ancestors,  that  many  years  before  there  were  any  Incas,  at 
the  time  when  the  country  was  very  populous,  there  happened 
a  great  flood ;  the  sea  breaking  out  beyond  its  bounds,  so  that 
the  land  was  covered  with  water,  and  all  the  people  perished. 
The  Guancas  inhabiting  the  vale  of  Xausca,  and  the  nations 
of  Chiquito  in  the  province  of  Caliao,  add  that  some  persons 
remained  in  the  hollows  and  caves  of  the  highest  mountains, 
who  again  peopled  the  land.  Others  of  the  mountain  people 
affirm  that  all  perished  in  the  deluge,  only  six  persons  being 


REMARKS  ON  PROOF  FROM  TRADITION.       127 

saved  on  a  float,  from  whom  descended  all  the  inhabitants  of 
the  country."  The  natives  of  Terra  Firma  believe,  that 
"  when  the  universal  deluge  happened,  one  man,  with  his 
wife  and  children,  escaped  in  a  canoe,  and  that  from  them 
the  world  had  been  peopled,"  &c.  "  The  most  barbarous  of 
the  Brazilians,"  says  Herrera,  "  have  some  knowledge  of  a 
general  deluge ;  it  being  their  opinion  that  the  whole  race  of 
mankind  were  extirpated  by  this  means,  except  one  man  and 
his  own  sister,  who  being  enceinte  before,  they  by  degrees 
repeopled  the  world."  The  Brazilians  near  the  coast  had  a 
very  particular  tradition  of  a  deluge,  which  grew  out  of  a 
quarrel  between  two  brothers,  and  which  rose  until  the  earth 
was  entirely  submerged.  All  mankind  were  destroyed  ex- 
cept the  two  brothers  and  their  wives ;  who  were  saved  by 
climbing  trees  on  the  tops  of  the  mountains.  The  Crees,  a 
tribe  of  Arctic  Indians,  Dr.  Richardson  (a  companion  of 
Franklin  in  his  polar  expedition)  says,  "  all  spoke  of  a  uni- 
versal deluge,  from  which  one  family  alone  escaped,  with  all 
kinds  of  birds  and  beasts,  on  a  huge  raft."  "  Even  the 
Indians  of  the  Choctaw  tribe"  (says  Dr.  Hamilton,  in  his 
Friend  of  Moses,  page  322)  "  had,  it  is  well  known,  when  they 
first  came  into  contact  with  the  whites,  traditions  handed 
down  from  their  remotest  ancestors,  of  a  mighty  deluge,  from 
which  a  small  number  of  persons  only  escaped  on  a  raft.  In 
these  North  American  Indian  traditions  a  muskrat  figures  as 
the  substitute  of  Noah's  dove."  The  tradition  of  a  general 
flood,  we  are  by  good  authority  informed,  is  found  among  the 
natives  of  the  South  Sea  Islands.  The  inhabitants  of  Tahiti, 
being  asked  concerning  their  origin,  replied  that  "  their 
Supreme  God,  a  long  time  ago,  being  angry,  dragged  the 
earth  through  the  sea,  when  their  Island  was  broken  off  and 
preserved." 

Now  if  any  feel  themselves  able,  we  confess  we  do  not, 
to  account  philosophically  or  rationally  for  such  remarkable 
and  wide-spread  coincidences  as  are  traceable  between  these 


128  MYTHOLOGICAL    EVIDENCE. 

traditions  and  the  Scriptural  account  of  the  deluge  of  Noah, 
without  supposing  them  all  to  refer  to  one  and  the  same 
event.  The  ark :  why  find  we  so  frequent  mention  made 
of  it  as  the  vessel  in  which  the  survivors  were  preserved, 
when  a  vessel  of  some  other  form  might  be  more  naturally 
imagined  as  the  means  of  preservation  ?  And,  more  es- 
pecially, whence  the  notion  of  sending  out  the  dove  and  the 
raven,  to  ascertain  the  state  of  the  earth's  surface  ?  And 
why  into  the  earliest  and  the  fabulous  periods  of  a  nation's 
history  is  the  deluge  of  tradition  thrown  back  ?  "Admit  these 
traditions  to  be  all  founded  upon  the  Noachian  deluge,"  as 
one  remarks,  "  and  all  difficulties  vanish ;  but  deny  this 
identity,  and  we  need  a  miracle,  greater  than  would  be  re- 
quired for  a  universal  deluge,  to  resolve  them." 

But  to  other  than  such  oral  or  written  traditions  we  might 
resort  to  find  proof  confirmatory  of  the  Mosaic  account  of  the 
event  we  are  considering.  It  might  be  shown  that  memorials 
of  the  Noachic  deluge  were  wrought  into  the  very  structure 
of  heathenism.  The  ancient  systems  of  mythology  and 
polytheism  have  been  shown  to  be  filled  with  idolatrous  com- 
memorations of  that  occurrence.  Look  at  Bryant's  "  Analy- 
sis of  Ancient  Mythology,"  or  that  more  recent  work,  Har- 
court's  "  Doctrine  of  the  Deluge,"  and  you  will  see  this  in 
lengthened  and  amplified  detail  exhibited.  "We  cannot  con- 
sent to  fatigue  you  with  a  recital.  We  will  but  give  you  "a 
brick  as  a  specimen  of  the  building."  In  the  character  of 
Inachus,  Atlas,  Dionusos,  Janus,  Zeus,  Saturn,  and  several 
other  gods  and  goddesses  among  the  Greeks,  Noah  and  his 
sons  may  be  distinctly  recognized.  In  the  Orient,  our  patri- 
arch was  called  Noas,  Noasis,  Nusus,  and  Nus.  Hence  the 
Greek  Dionusos,  the  prototype  of  the  Latin  Bacchus,  whose 
name  has  generally  been  supposed  to  be  derived  from  Dios, 
the  genitive  of  Zeus,  and  Nuse,  a  city  of  India ;  or,  more 
probably,  the  city  took  its  name  from  Nusus,  since  there  were 
many  other  cities  of  that  name,  as  well  as  mountains,  in 


MYTHOLOGICAL    EVIDENCE.  129 

various  parts  of  the  world,  mostly  distinguished,  however,  for 
the  cultivation  of  the  vine.  This  Dionusos  the  Greeks  made 
a  great  warrior,  "  who  went  with  an  army  over  the  face  of 
the  whole  earth ;  and  taught  mankind,  as  he  passed  along, 
the  method  of  planting  the  vine ;  and  how  to  press  out  the 
juice  and  receive  it  in  proper  vessels."  Such  an  allusion, 
young  gentlemen,  to  the  character  and  some  of  the  most 
striking  incidents  in  the  life  of  Noah  can  hardly  have  been 
accidental.  In  the  ancient  sacred  mysteries,  too,  as  well 
as  in  the  histories  of  the  individual  who  survived  some 
terrible  catastrophe,  there  is  frequent  reference  to  the  door 
of  the  ark,  and  the  imprisonment  of  Noah  within  it,  for  a 
time.  "  The  entrance  through  it,"  (the  door,)  says  Bryan t? 
"  the  ancients  esteemed  a  passage  to  death  and  darkness  ; 
but  the  egress  from  it  was  represented  as  a  return  to  life. 
Hence  the  opening  and  shutting  of  it  were  religiously 
recorded.  And  as  the  stay  in  the  ark  was  an  intermediate 
state  between  a  lost  world  and  a  world  renewed,  this  was 
also  alluded  to  in  their  hieroglyphical  representations.  We 
accordingly  find  Janus  with  two  faces ;  having  a  retrospect  to 
what  was  past,  as  well  as  a  view  forward  to  what  was  to 
come.  They  styled  him  Patulcius  and  Clusius,  in  allusion  to 
the  history  above  given.  The  person  preserved  is  always 
mentioned  as  preserved  in  an  ark.  He  is  described  as  being 
in  a  state  of  darkness,  which  is  represented  allegorically  as  a 
state  of  death.  He  then  obtains  a  new  life,  which  is  called  a 
second  birth,  and  he  is  said  to  have  his  youth  renewed.  He 
is  on  this  account  looked  upon  as  the  first-born  of  mankind ; 
and  both  his  antediluvian  and  postdiluvian  states  are  com- 
memorated, and  sometimes  the  intermediate  state  also  is 
spoken  of." 

The  author  just  quoted  from,  supposes  the  Triad  of  Plato, 
Proclus,  and  other  ancient  writers,  to  have  been  derived  from 
the  deification  of  the  three  families  of  which  our  patriarch 
was  the  head.  This  has  indeed  by  some  been  supposed  to 


130  9  MYTHOLOGICAL    EVIDENCE. 

have  reference  to  the  Trinity  of  the  Scriptures ;  but  these 
give  evidence  in  other  parts  of  their  writings  that  such  a 
doctrine  was  unknown  to  them.  The  patriarch  and  his  three 
sons  are  likewise,  in  other  connections,  alluded  to  by  the 
ancient  mythologists. 

"  In  the  ceremonies  of  heathen  worship,"  (quoting  the  lan- 
guage of  a  writer  in  the  Biblical  Repository,  vol.  9,  page  91,) 
"  the  ark  was  a  very  conspicuous  object.  There  was  the 
sacred  Baris  of  the  Egyptians,  made  use  of  in  celebrating 
the  rites  of  Osiris ;  the  ship  of  Iris  at  Rome,  carried  yearly 
in  procession,  and  the  sacred  cups  in  the  form  of  boats,  called 
Cymbia  and  Scyphi,  which  were  used  in  a  similar  manner. 
The  deification  of  the  ark,  or  rather  of  the  genius  of  the  ark, 
is  very  manifest  in  the  names  and  characters  of  numerous  hea- 
then deities.  The  ark  was  distinguished  by  the  terms  Theba, 
Baris,  Arguz,  Aren,  Arene,  Laris,  Boutus,  Boeotus,  Cibotus, 
etc.  And  from  these  names  were  formed  different  divinities. 
But  as  the  terms  have  various  degrees  of  correspondence,  a 
relation  more  or  less  remote  was  supposed  to  exist  between 
the  deities  formed  from  them.  Sometimes  we  perceive  a 
confounding  together  of  the  ark  and  Noah ;  but  this  is  not 
unexpected,  for  the  whole  of  the  heathen  mythology  consists 
of  an  absurd  mixture  of  truth  with  error." 

"  In  this  connection,"  the  same  writer  goes  on  to  say,  "  the 
famous  Ogdoas  of  the  Egyptians  should  be  mentioned.  This 
consisted  of  eight  persons  sailing  together  in  the  Sacred  Baris 
or  ark.  And  there  is  not  small  reason  for  believing  that  the 
famous  Argonautic  Expedition,  celebrated  by  the  Greeks, 
was  fabulous,  and  that  its  history  in  fact  was  derived  from 
the  history  of  the  Noachian  deluge." 

Among  other  mementos  of  this  catastrophe  incorporated 
into  ancient  mythology,  we  find  the  dove,  the  raven,  and  the 
rainbow.  The  latter,  according  to  Moses,  having  been  con- 
stituted the  token  of  a  covenant  between  God  and  man,  was 
held  in  uncommon  regard  for  many  ages.  But  the  dove  is 


MYTHOLOGICAL    EVIDENCE.  131 

found  in  almost  all  the  mythological  histories.  It  was 
regarded  as  a  peculiar  messenger  of  the  gods,  and  emblem 
of  peace  and  good  fortune.  On  the  other  hand,  the  raven, 
which,  unlike  the  dove,  disappointed  the  hopes  of  Noah  by 
never  returning  to  the  ark,  was  generally  regarded  as  a  bird 
of  ill  omen.  Among  the  ancient  Amonians  the  name  of  the 
dove  was  Ion,  lona,  or  lones ;  —  hence  the  Oinas  of  the 
Greeks.  This  bird  was  assumed  by  the  Babylonians  for 
their  national  ensign,  having  been  depicted  upon  their  military 
standards.  They  were  hence  styled  lonians,  or  children  of  the 
dove ;  and  their  city  lonah.  These  titles  are  given  in  Jer. 
25  :  38 ;  also  46  :  16 ;  and  50  :  16.  We  are  told  that  it  was 
a  custom  among  the  ancient  mariners  to  let  fly  from  the  ship, 
during  a  voyage,  a  dove  or  a  pigeon,  in  order  to  predict  by 
its  movements  the  success  of  their  voyage.  It  was  thought 
to  be  the  best  time  for  sailing,  when  the  sun  and  the  seven 
stars  near  the  head  of  Taurus  were  in  conjunction.  Hence 
these  stars  are  called  Peleiades  or  Pleiades,  the  doves.  The 
goddess  Venus  appears  to  have  been  the  ancient  lonah  ;  and 
hence  in  her  history  are  numerous  allusions  to  the  dove  of 
Noah  and  the  deluge.  (See  Bib.  Rep.  vol.  9,  p.  91.) 

Similar  allusions  to  the  Noachic  deluge  are  afforded  in  the 
mythologies  of  other  nations  besides  those  of  Greece  and 
Rome.  They  are  to  be  found,  e.  g.,  in  the  histories  of  the 
Phenician  Sydyk,  Dagon,  and  Agmenes ;  the  Assyrian 
Derceto  and  Astarte ;  the  Egyptian  Isis,  Osiris,  Sesostris  and 
Oannes  ;  the  Chinese  Fohi,  and  the  Hindoo  Menu,  Buddhu, 
and  Vishnu.  Although  there  is  much  room  here  for  the 
play  of  a  fertile  imagination,  yet  the  allusions  are  frequently 
too  striking,  and  the  coincidences  too  remarkable,  to  allow  us 
to  impute  all  to  fancy,  and  they  justify  us  in  coming  to  the 
conclusion  that  the  deluge  of  Noah  formed  a  principal  ground- 
work of  ancient  mythology. 

Before  leaving  altogether  this  branch  of  the  subject,  permit 
me  to  refer  you,  in  the  briefest  manner,  to  two  or  three  matters 


132  THE  APAMEAN  MEDALS. 

partaking  of  the  character  of  ancient  memorials  of  the 
deluge.  The  first  of  these  that  I  will  name  are  the  famous 
Apamean  medals  —  I  mean  certain  imperial  bronze  medals  of 
the  city  of  Apamea,  in  Phrygia.  Whilst  they  bear  on  one 
side  the  head  of  different  emperors,  there  is  inscribed  on  the 
other,  in  the  language  of  Eckhel,  "  A  chest  swimming  upon 
the  waters,  in  which  a  man  and  woman  appear  from  the 
breast  upwards.  Without  it,  with  their  faces  turned  from  it, 
advance  a  woman  robed,  and  a  man  in  a  short  garment,  hold- 
ing up  their  right  hands.  On  the  lid  of  the  chest  stands  a 
bird,  and  another,  balanced  in  air,  holds  in  its  claws  an  olive 
branch."  (See  Eckhel's  Doctrina  Numorum  Veterum.)  In 
Lecture  Ninth  of  his  work  on  the  Connection  between  Science 
and  Revealed  Religion,  Dr.  Wiseman  remarks  on  this :  "  The 
small  compass  of  a  medal  could  hardly  give  a  more  expressive 
representation  of  this  great  event"  —  the  Noachian  deluge. 
"We  have  two  different  scenes,  but  manifestly  the  same 
actors.  For  the  costume  and  heads  of  the  persons  standing 
outside,  do  not  allow  us  to  consider  them  others  than  the 
figures  in  the  ark.  We  have  these  individuals  first  floating 
over  the  waters  in  an  ark ;  then  standing  on  dry  land  in  an 
attitude  of  admiration,  with  the  dove  bearing  the  symbol  of 
peace  above  them.  But  the  most  interesting  circumstance 
yet  remains.  On  the  front  panel  of  this  ark  are  some  letters, 
and  the  discussion  of  their  import  has  been  the  subject  of 
many  learned  dissertations.  Bianchini  published  two  copies 
of  this  medal,  on  one  of  which  he  reads  NOE,  and  on  the 
other  NEO,  the  former  of  which  readings  Falconieri  also 
gives  upon  another  medal.  Eckhel,  after  examining  the  dif- 
ferent explanations  given  by  others,  etc.,  concludes  that  as 
the  entire  scene  represented  on  the  medal,  bears  manifest 
reference  to  the  Noachian  deluge,  so  must  the  inscription  on 
the  ark ;  and  that  consequently  it  is  the  name  of  that  patri- 
arch. This  he  illustrates  from  the  coins  of  Magnesia  in 
Ionia,  on  which  is  the  figure  of  a  ship,  bearing  the  inscrip- 


ADDITIONAL    MEMORIALS.  133 

tion  ARGO  ;  no  doubt  for  the  purpose  of  clearly  specifying 
the  mythological  event  to  which  it  refers,  the  expedition  of 
the  Argonauts." 

But,  it  may  be  asked,  what  could  have  induced  the 
Apameans  to  choose  such  an  event  for  their  symbol  on  their 
coins  ?  To  this  we  have  the  reply,  That  it  was  customary 
for  cities  to  take,  as  their  emblems,  any  remarkable  event 
which  was  fabled,  or  reported  to  have  happened  there. 
Thus  the  city  of  Thermae,  in  Sicily,  has  Hercules  upon  its 
coins,  because  he  is  supposed  in  mythology  to  have  there 
reposed.  Now  this  is  precisely  the  case  with  Apamea,  or,  as 
it  anciently  was  called,  Celeene.  For  the  Sibylline  books, 
which,  however  spurious,  are  sufficient  testimony  of  the  exist- 
ence of  a  popular  tradition,  expressly  tell  us,  that  in  the 
neighborhood  of  Celaene  stands  the  mountain  Ararat,  upon 
which  the  ark  reposed.  This  tradition,  evidently,  having  no 
reference  to  Deucalion's  deluge,  the  seat  of  which  was 
Greece,  is  sufficient  to  account  for  the  adoption  of  such  a* 
representation  upon  the  Apamean  coins.  Hence,  too,  prob- 
ably, arose  another  ancient  name  of  this  city,  Kibotos,  (Gr. 
the  Ark,)  as  Winkelman  has  shown ;  and  this  name  is  the  very 
word  used  by  the  Septuagint  and  Josephus  in  describing 
Noah's  ark.  You  may  see  a  plate  in  the  work  of  Wiseman, 
referred  to,  giving  a  striking  representation  of  these  medals. 

In  the  same  work,  likewise,  there  is  brought  to  our  notice 
an  extremely  curious  monument,  which  is  considered  as 
bearing  no  other  explanation  but  such  as  has  been  given  to 
the  Apamean  medals,  that  is,  as  commemorative  of  the 
deluge.  It  was  found  in  the  year  1696,  by  a  workman, 
whilst  engaged  in  excavating  a  monument  in  the  vicinity  of 
Rome.  It  came,  we  are  told,  into  the  possession  of  the 
antiquarian  Ficoroni,  and  a  minute  account  of  it  was  pub- 
lished by  Bianchini,  in  the  following  year.  An  engraving 
accompanies  it,  a  copy  of  which,  together  with  a  description, 
you  may  find  in  Dr.  Wiseman's  ninth  lecture.  We  hope  you 
7 


134  ADDITIONAL   MEMORIALS. 

will,  at  the  earliest  opportunity,  look  at  the  representation, 
and  read  the  description  there  given.  You  will  be  both 
entertained  and  instructed  by  it.  Of  this  monument,  it  will 
not  be  an  easy  matter  to  give  any  other  explanation  than 
what  must  obviously  strike  one's  mind  at  once  —  that  it 
alludes  to  the  destruction  of  the  human  race,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  a  few,  who,  with  pairs  of  animals,  were  saved  in  some 
species  of  ark  or  chest. 

In  a  series  of  pictures  representing  ceremonies  in  honor  of 
Bacchus,  found  in  the  lava-whelmed  city  of  Herculaneum, 
appears,  we  are  told,  what  may  with  some  probability  be 
supposed  to  offer  the  form  which  the  ancients  imagined  the 
ark  to  possess,  and  what  well  enough  accords  with  the  idea 
we  have  entertained  of  it.  Upon  her  shoulder  a  woman  is 
carrying  a  square  box,  having  a  projecting  roof,  and  at  the 
end  a  door.  Being  borne  in  a  commemorative  procession,  it 
is  manifestly  a  sacred  Thebat  or  ark.  Its  door  at  the  side, 
and  its  projecting  roof,  show  that  it  was  not  a  bare  chest ; 
whilst  the  absence  of  the  usual  characteristics,  and  the 
occasion  of  its  use,  indicate  that  it  is  not  a  model  house,  or 
a  votive  offering. 

It  is  not  unlikely  that  those  of  the  monuments  called 
Druidical,  which  bear  the  name  of  kistvaens,  and  in  which 
the  stones  are  disposed  in  the  form  of  a  chest  or  house,  were 
intended  as  memorials  of  the  ark.  At  least  it  has  been 
shown  by  Davis,  (Celtic  Researches,)  that  the  ark  was  not 
only  typified  among  the  Celts  by  rafts  and  islands,  but  by 
a  stone  ark  or  chest,  which  is  precisely  the  meaning  of 
kist-(chest)-vaen.  (See  Kitto's  Cyc. :  art.  Ark.) 

The  opinion  is  indorsed  by  the  respected  author  of  Bible 
Illustrations,  (vol.  1,  p.  157,)  that  the  sacred  mountains  of 
various  lands  are  to  be  viewed  as  "  commemorative  of  the 
mount  on  which  the  ark  rested,  and  which  was  venerated  as 
the  spot  of  ground,  once  isolated  among  the  waters,  to  which 
the  nations  of  mankind  may  all  trace  they-  origin."  And  the 


ADDITIONAL    MEMORIALS.  135 

same  writer  intimates  it  to  be  an  idea  entitled  to  belief,  that 
the  "high  places"  on  which  the  Jews  were  wont  to  offer 
their  worship,  had  the  same  reference.  He  even  imagines  it 
probable,  that  the  pyramids  of  Egypt,  and,  still  more,  the  tall 
masses  of  broken  masonry  which  yet  appear  in  the  Babylonian 
plains,  were  intended  to  represent  or  symbolize  the  mountain 
from  which  the  Noachida3  had  gone  forth.  Finally,  we 
would  remark,  that  the  conjecture  has  not,  to  some,  appeared 
improbable,  that  the  "mounds,"  —  those  mountains  in  minia- 
ture which  are  to  be  found  in  such  numbers  both  in  the 
eastern  and  western  world,  —  were  designed  for  a  similar 
end. 


EVENING  TENTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLMEN  : 

Justly  may  it  be  thought  by  you  high  time  for  us  to  in- 
quire whether,  in  addition  to  the  evidences  adduced  in  the 
two  preceding  Exercises,  any  physical  proofs  exist  of  the 
Noachic  cataclysm ;  —  anything  on  the  globe,  the  theatre 
professedly  of  such  an  occurrence,  that  may  with  propriety 
be  regarded  as  corroborative  of  the  statements  contained  in 
the  seventh  and  eighth  chapters  of  Genesis.  Are  there 
any  discernible  marks,  any  distinguishable  traces,  on  or  be- 
neath the  earths  surface,  of  an  event  corresponding  in  its 
prominent  features  with  what  is  distinctively  denominated 
the  Noachian  Deluge  ? 

A  minute  and  full  narrative  of  human  belief  or  opinion 
relating  to  this  point,  as  well  as  to  the  cause  or  causes  oper- 
ating to  produce  the  catastrophe,  along  with  the  manner  of 
occurrence,  would  constitute  both  a  long  and  a  curious  por- 
tion of  history.  To  give  such  a  narration  in  regard  to  each, 
would  occupy  more  time  than  either  you  or  myself  would,  in 
our  limited  evening  series,  consider  desirable.  With  some 
brief  notices  of  opinions  concerning  them,  severally,  we  must 
at  present  content  ourselves. 

In  Sir  Charles  Lyell's  work,  entitled  Principles  of  Geology  ; 
and  in  Dr.  John  Pye  Smith's  Relation  between  the  Holy 
Scriptures  and  some  parts  of  Geological  Science  ;  as  well  as 


INQUIRY   AS   TO   PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE.  137 

in  Dr.  Edward  Hitchcock's  Religion  of  Geology,  may  be 
found  a  somewhat  full  statement,  especially  taken  together, 
in  regard  to  these ;  — -  and  to  which  works  we  take  pleasure 
in  referring  you. 

That  the  earth,  particularly  its  crust,  has  undergone  great 
changes  since  this  planet's  original  formation  by  its  Creator? 
you  do  not  need  to  be  informed.  Whether  any,  and  if  any, 
what  distinguishable  portion  of  these  changes  may  be  correct- 
ly attributed  to  the  instrumentality  of  the  Noachic  Flood,  is  a 
matter  concerning  which  you  may,  in  this  connection,  be  justly 
desirous  to  hear  at  least  a  little.  In  what  we  shall  attempt 
touching  this,  will  be  almost  unavoidably  intermingled,  here 
and  there,  some  historic  notices  of  opinion  pertaining  to  the 
instrumental  cause  or  causes,  and  mode  of  occurrence,  of  the 
Noachic  cataclysm. 

Dr.  Thomas  Burnet,  following  Des  Cartes,  entertained  the 
opinion  that  anterior  to  Noah's  Flood,  our  terrestrial  ball  was 
so  different  in  the  appearance  of  its  surface  from  what  it 
ever  since  has  exhibited,  as  to  have  presented  to  the  view  a 
perfectly  round  body,  without  eminences,  valleys,  or  sea ;  "  an 
orbicular  crust,  smooth,  regular,  and  uniform,"  investing  the 
face  of  the  abyss  or  deep ;  —  that  this  crust,  being  heated  by 
constant,  unvarying  action  of  the  sun,  became  dry  and  chinky, 
and  by  the  rarefaction  and  expansion  of  the  inclosed  vapors, 
clave,  burst,  and  fell  down  irregularly  into  the  water,  crowd- 
ing the  latter  up,  thus  producing  an  inundation,  and  drowning 
the  former  inhabitants.  Thus,  according  to  this  author,  our 
ocean  is  a  part  of  the  ancient  abyss ;  the  rest  of  this  latter 
remains  in  the  internal  cavities  with  which  the  sea  has  still  a 
communication.  Islands  and  sea-rocks  are  the  small  frag- 
ments, and  continents  are  the  large  masses  of  the  ancient 
crust.  As  both  the  rupture  and  fall  of  this  crust  were 
effected  in  a  confused  manner,  it  is  not  surprising  that  the 
surface  of  the  present  earth  should  be  full  of  mountains, 
gulfs,  plains,  and  irregularities  of  every  kind. 


138  INQUIRY  AS   TO    PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE 

But,  according  to  the  theory  of  this  cosmologist,  not  only 
was  the  earth's  surface  thus  altered  at  the  time  of  Noah's 
flood,  but  the  earth  itself,  relatively  to  the  sun,  changed  as 
to  its  position.  By  the  diluvial  catastrophe,  the  violence  of 
the  shock  which  the  earth  received  was  so  great,  that  the 
plane  of  the  equator  and  that  of  the  ecliptic,  which  were 
before  coincident,  became  variant  in  the  measure  which  ever 
since  has  existed:  whence  arose  the  difference  of  seasons, 
which,  of  course,  did  not  belong  to  the  antediluvian  earth. 

These  views  were  set  forth  in  extenso,  and  in  a  style  ornate 
and  attractive,  in  a  work  published,  a  part  in  1680,  and  the 
remainder  in  1689,  the  full  title  of  which,  curiously  enough, 
runs  thus :  — "  The  sacred  theory  of  the  Earth  ;  containing 
an  account  of  the  original  of  the  Earth,  and  of  all  the  general 
changes  which  it  hath  already  undergone,  or  is  to  undergo, 
till  the  consummation  of  all  things." 

If  this  theory  of  Burnet,  young  gentlemen,  were  regarded 
by  us  as  true,  then,  —  whenever  we  looked  upon  a  mountain, 
or  any  eminence ;  or  into  a  valley  of  either  a  greater  or  less 
extent  or  depth ;  or  abroad  upon  the  sea,  or  any  considerable 
body  of  waters ;  or  witnessed,  as  we  are  not  unwelcomely 
compelled  to  do,  the  changing  seasons,  —  we  should  have 
confirmatory  evidence,  through  the  medium  of  sight  afforded 
us,  of  the  truth  of  the  Mosaic  History  in  reference  to  the 
Noachian  Deluge. 

The  correctness  of  those  views  of  Burnet,  which  we  have 
specified,  was  early  called  in  question.  That  they  were 
tmphilosophical,  appears  to  have  been  believed  by  Newton 
and  La  Place,  and  to  have  been  elaborately  shown  by  Keill. 
And  that  they  are  unscriptural,  must  be  obvious  to  any  care- 
ful reader  of  the  Mosaic  account,  which  expressly  mentions 
mountains  as  the  standard  of  altitude  of  the  diluvial  waters, 
as  well  as  indicates,  in  the  form  of  promise,  that  every  thing 
pertaining  to  climatic  variations,  or  mutations  of  seasons, 
should  be  restored  to  its  ancient  state,  (Gen.  7 :  19,  20 ;  8 : 


OF  THE  NOACHIC  DELUGE.  139 

22.)  It  might  be  added,  that  by  denying  a  sea  to  the  ante- 
diluvian earth,  as  you  have  seen  Burnet's  theory  to  do,  it 
comes  directly  in  conflict  with  that  scriptural  statement 
concerning  the  work  of  the  third  day,  that  "  the  waters  under 
the  heavens  were  gathered  together  unto  one  place,  and  the 
dry  land  appeared ;  and  that  God  called  the  dry  land  earth, 
and  the  gathering  together  of  the  waters  called  he  seas" 
(Gen.  1 :  9,  10.)  Yet,  strange  to  say,  Burnet  was  of  the 
clerical  profession,  and  no  doubt  imagined  his  theory  to  be 
not  only  philosophical,  but  scriptural.  How  accommodatingly 
does  a  man's  belief  often  shape  itself  to  his  wishes !  Yet,  of 
the  work  of  this  author,  let  me  say,  that  though  it  was  but  "a 
fine  historical  romance,"  as  BuiFon  afterwards  called  it,  it 
nevertheless,  in  Burnet's  time,  met  with  laudations  from  some 
high  sources,  and  was  treated  by  numbers  as  one  of  profound 
science. 

Living  in  an  age  when  the  word  geology  is  so  much  on 
the  tongue,  and  the  utterances  of  that  science  which  the  word 
indicates,  so  widely  promulgated,  you  cannot  be. wholly  un- 
acquainted with  palaeontology^  or  the  subject  of  "fossil  organic 
remains"  It  was  not  until  the  latter  part  of  the  sixteenth 
century  that  there  was,  in  Christian  nations,  any  marked 
interest  taken  either  in  these  or  any  thing  else  pertaining  to 
geology.  In  1517,  some  excavations  being  made  at  Verona, 
in  Italy,  for  the  purpose  of  repairing  the  city,  brought  to  light 
marine  shells  and  other  organized  fossils,  which  led  to  the 
agitation  of  two  or  three  interesting  questions  respecting 
them.  One  of  these  questions  related  to  their  nature  and 
origin.  First,  —  Were  they  the  remains  of  once  organized 
and  living  creatures?  or  were  they  merely  simulacra,  or 
resemblances?  Fracastoro  was  one  of  a  few  who  main- 
tained, that  they  were  once  real  animals.  The  major  num- 
ber contended,  that  they  never  belonged  to  living  things  — 
were  simulacra  solely.  Next,  —  How  did  they  originate? 
If  they  once  belonged  to  living  creatures,  all  who  were  not 


140  INQUIRY   AS   TO   PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE: 

actual  atheists,  were  prepared  to  ascribe  their  origin  to  the 
Great  First  Cause.  Those  who  thought  them  to  be  only 
resemblances,  were  divided  in  opinion  as  to  their  origin,  —  a 
part  maintaining  that  the  Almighty  made  the  layers  of  rock 
with  these  marks  or  figures  in  them,  just  after  the  manner  in 
which  they  are  found ;  others,  that  they  were  produced  by 
"  a  plastic  force,"  which,  it  was  said,  had  power  to  fashion 
stones  into  organic  forms.  Andrea  Mattioli  embraced  the 
notion,  and  was  followed  in  it  by  numbers,  that  a  certain 
"  materia  pinguis,"  or  "  fatty  matter,"  existing  in  the  earth, 
and  set  into  fermentation  by  heat,  gave  birth  to  fossil  organic 
shapes.  Fallopia,  of  Padua,  conceived  that  petrified  shells 
were  generated  by  fermentation  in  the  spots  where  they  are 
found ;  or  that  they  had  in  some  cases  acquired  their  form 
from  the  "  tumultuous  movements  of  terrestrial  exhalations.' 
(See  Lyell's  Principles  of  Geology,  vol.  1,  p.  38.)  In  the 
same  spirit  Mercati,  who  published,  in  1574,  faithful  figures 
of  the  fossil  shells  preserved  by  Pope  Sixtus  V.,  in  the 
museum  of  the  Vatican,  expressed  an  opinion  that  they  were 
mere  stones,  which  had  assumed  their  peculiar  configuration 
from  the  influence  of  the  heavenly  bodies  ;  and  Olivi,  of  Cre- 
mona, who  described  the  fossil  remains  of  a  rich  museum  at 
Verona,  was  satisfied  with  considering  them  as  mere  "  sports 
of  nature."  Palissy,  a  French  writer,  undertook,  in  1580,  to 
combat  the  notions  of  many  of  his  contemporaries  in  Italy,  in 
regard  to  petrified  shells.  Of  him  Fontenelle,  when  pro- 
nouncing his  eulogy  in  the  French  Academy,  a  century  and 
a  half  later,  said,  He  was  the  first  who  dared  to  assert  in 
Paris,  that  fossil  remains  of  testacea  and  fish  had  once  be- 
longed to  marine  animals,  —  that  they  were  not  mere  freaks 
of  nature.  In  opposition  to  the  prejudices  of  the  age,  (1688,) 
Hooke.  and  some  others  with  him,  we  are  told  by  Lyell, 
argued  against  the  idea,  that  nature  had  formed  fossil  bodies 
for  no  other  end  than  to  play  the  mimic  in  the  mineral  king- 
dom, —  maintaining  that  figured  stones  were  really  the  sev- 


THEORIES    AND    FACTS    CONSIDERED.  141 

eral  bodies  they  represent,  or  the  mouldings  of  them  petrified ; 
and  not,  as  some  have  imagined,  a  lusus  naturce,  sporting 
herself  in  the  needless  formation  of  useless  beings.  (See 
Lyell's  Prin.  of  Geol.,  vol.  1,  p.  45.) 

Those  of  you,  young  gentlemen,  who  have  inspected  speci- 
mens of  these  fossils,  whether  on  the  spots  where  they  reposed 
in  or  were  taken  from  their  rocky  beds,  or  arranged  on  their 
shelves  in  cabinets,  can  have,  we  are  persuaded,  but  one  opinion 
about  them.  Not  a  lingering  doubt  can  with  such  remain 
that  the  vital  principle  once  had  place  within  them.  Freaks 
of  nature !  such  freaks  ?  Impossible  !  As  to  the  Almighty 
Creator,  —  that  he  could  form  all  the  layers  of  rock  which 
encircle  this  earthly  ball,  with  all  the  figures  in  them  which 
we  call  animal  petrifactions,  who  entertains  a  doubt  ?  But 
then,  would  he  ?  Would  he  so  exert  his  power  as  to  impinge 
his  wisdom  ?  as  to  cast  reflection  on  that  attribute  ?  What  ! 
the  Infinite  God  exercise  his  puissance  and  skill  in  organizing, 
with  utmost  nicety,  matter  into  nameless  varieties  and  count- 
less numbers  of  exactly  and  minutely  organized  resemblances 
to  the  forms  of  living  things !  And  for  what  end  ?  One 
worthy  of  the  Infinitely  Wise  ?  Who  will  say,  Yes  ?  Those 
who  have  held,  or,  if  such  a  supposition  can  be  entertained, 
do  hold  what  we  call  animal  petrifactions  to  be  mere  simulacra, 
and  produced,  moreover,  by  "a,  plastic  force  "  or  a  "materia 
pinguis"  can  hardly  escape  the  imputation  of  being  "  without 
God  in  the  world ;  "  of  holding  a  tenet  atheistic  in  its  character 
or  bearings ;  of  nullifying  or  ignoring  one  of  the  strongest 
evidences  of  the  Divine  Existence;  we  mean,  marks  of  de- 
sign ;  signs  of  contrivance  and  skill. 

The  controversy  or  discussion  regarding  the  nature  and 
origin  of  fossil  organic  remains,  which  we  mentioned  as 
started  in  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century,  did  not 
cease  with  the  termination  of  that  century  ;  if  it  did  altogether 
indeed  with  that  of  the  two  following  centuries. 

But   another  question   in   regard   to   these   remains,  and 


142  INQUIRY   AS    TO    PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE! 

which,  as  having  a  special  bearing  on  the  topic  on  hand,  we 
have  now  to  do  with  — -  a  question  much  and  warmly  discussed 
at  the  time  and  place  we  specified,  —  had  respect  to  the  cause 
and  manner,  including  locality,  of  their  deposition.  They  — 
marine  as  well  as  other  fossils  —  are  to  be  found,  so  to  speak, 
every  where  ;  on  mountains  as  well  as  on  plains  —  reposing 
in,  helping  to  compose,  the  rocky  strata  which  encase  the 
earth.  Now,  as  we  intimated,  the  additional  question  which 
was  started  by  the  simple  occurrence  at  Verona,  was,  How 
were  they  brought  into  the  situations  which  they  occupy  ?  With 
the  exception  of  a  few,  Fracastoro  at  their  head,  the  answer 
was,  They  were  deposited  there  by  Noah's  deluge.  And  from 
that  time  onward  for  three  hundred  years  —  shall  I  say  up 
to  this  day  ?  —  the  same  question  was  agitated ;  and  until 
recently  —  within  a  comparatively  few  years  past  —  the 
major  part  even  of  the  learned,  returned  the  answer  a  mo- 
ment since  stated :  They  were  brought  and  deposited  where 
they  are  by  the  deluge  of  Noah.  A  large  number  of  writers, 
living  at  different  periods  of  the  three  centuries  preceding  the 
present,  might  be  named  as  holding  and  attempting  to  support 
the  tenet  embraced  in  the  answer  just  given  ;  —  but  we  will 
quote  only  a  few  among  the  more  recent.  "  It  may  also  be 
observed,"  says  the  Encyclopedia  of  Religious  Knowledge, 
Art.  Deluge,  "  that  in  the  regions  far  remote  from  the 
Euphrates  and  Tigris,  viz.,  Italy,  Switzerland,  Germany,  Eng- 
land, the  United  States,  etc.,  there  are  frequently  found,  in 
places  scores  of  leagues  from  the  sea,  and  even  on  the  tops 
of  high  mountains,  whole  trees  sunk  deep  under  ground,  as 
also  teeth  and  bones  of  animals,  fishes  entire,  sea-shells,  ears 
of  corn,  etc.,  petrified ;  which  the  best  naturalists  are  agreed 
could  never  have  come  there,  but  by  the  deluge."  Says  the 
Evangelical  Church  Journal  of  Prussia,  (see  Literary  and 
Theological  Review,  vol.  1,  p.  424,)  "  Equally  certain  must 
the  fact  of  a  former  flood,  overflowing  the  mountains,  appear 
to  the  naturalist,  (even  independent  of  the  Bible,  and  of  the 


THEORIES    AND    FACTS    CONSIDERED.  143 

traditions  of  many  ancient  nations  agreeing  with  it,)  when 
he  finds  millions  of  shells  upon  the  highest  mountain  tops," 
etc.  Even  Rees's  Cyclopedia,  Art.  Deluge,  states,  and 
without  any  correction,  that  "  the  present  external  surface  of 
the  earth,  its  internal  constitution,  the  arrangements  of  its 
various  strata,  the  remains  of  marine  animals  and  petrified 
shells  found  at  great  distances  from  their  original  habitation, 
incorporated  with  the  earth,  or  on  eminences  far  elevated 
above  the  level  of  the  sea,  etc.,  have  been  alleged  as  exist- 
ing monuments  of  a  deluge,  and  evidences  of  its  universali- 
ty." And  —  what  may  seem  strange  to  you  —  even  that 
really  able  and  scientific  man,  Mr.  Kirby,  so  late  as  in  the 
year  1835,  said,  in  his  Bridge  water  Treatise,  among  other 
things  respecting  the  deluge,  that  "  the  heavens  and  earth 
which  are  now,  are  different  from  the  heavens  and  earth 
which  were  destroyed  at  the  deluge  ;  and  the  latter  has  evi- 
dently been  reconstructed,  and  vegetable  and  animal  remains 
have  been  mixed  with  the  dislocated  materials  and  as  it  were 
detritus  of  the  original  world."  This  scientific  man  does 
indeed  confess  that  he  had  no  such  acquaintance  with  the 
science  of  Geology  as  to  qualify  him  to  speak  intelligently 
on  such  a  subject.  His  words  are,  "  My  own  knowledge  of 
Geology  and  its  principles,  as  now  laid  down,  is  too  slight  to 
qualify  me  to  compare  them  with  what  has  been  delivered  in 
Scripture  on  the  subjects  here  alluded  to"  —  that  is,  the 
general  subject  of  the  deluge.  "  What  a  pity,"  says  Rev. 
Pres.  Hitchcock,  "  after  such  a  confession,  that  he  should 
have  undertaken  to  theorize  upon  some  of  the  most  difficult 
parts  of  that  science,  and  to  defend  the  wild  hypothesis  of  the 
physico-theologists  of  bygone  centuries."  Mr.  Kirby  indeed 
shows  —  a  fact  that  may  somewhat  amaze  you  —  in  his 
Treatise  referred  to,  that  he  had  adopted,  with  slight  modifi- 
cations, the  essential  features  of  the  hypothesis  of  dissolution 
and  re-consolidation  of  the  earth  by  the  deluge,  set  forth  by 
Dr.  Jphn  "Woodward,  in  the  latter  part  of  the  seventeeth 
century. 


144  INQUIRY   AS    TO    PHYSICAL   EVIDENCE  : 

This  last  named  writer,  having  assumed  that  all  the 
geological  changes  which  appear  to  have  taken  place  in  the 
earth's  crust  were  produced  by  the  deluge  ;  and  perceiving 
that  the  solid  strata  to  a  great  depth  must  have  been  once  in 
a  fluid  state,  in  order  to  envelop  so  many  relics  of  organic 
nature,  adopted  the  idea  that  "  the  whole  terrestrial  globe 
was  taken  to  pieces  and  dissolved  at  the  flood  ;  and  that  the 
strata  settled  down  from  this  promiscuous  mass,  as  any  earthy 
sediment  from  a  fluid."  (Essay  towards  a  Natural  History 
of  the  Earth— Preface-—  1695.)  Believing  that  it  will  be 
agreeable  to  you  to  hear  something  additional  in  reference  to 
this  hypothesis  or  theory  of  Woodward,  we  will  give  you  a 
brief  abstract  from  Recs's  Cyclopedia :  —  "  Taking  the  sev- 
eral strata  for  the  sediments  of  a  deluge,  and  considering  the 
circumstances  of  those  fishes,  shells,  and  other  exuvisB 
found  in  them,  this  author  drew  several  illustrative  infer- 
ences —  as  First :  That  these  marine  bodies,  and  other  spoils 
of  salt-water  fishes,  were  borne  forth  out  of  the  sea  by  the 
general  deluge ;  and  on  the  return  of  the  water  to  its  ante- 
cedent bed,  were  left  behind  upon  the  land.  Secondly :  That 
while  the  flood  covered  the  globe,  all  the  solid  matters,  as 
stones,  metals,  minerals,  and  fossils,  were  totally  dissolved, 
and  the  cohesion  of  their  corpuscles,  with  those  of  the  less 
solid  bodies,  as  earth,  flesh  of  animals,  and  vegetables,  were 
sustained  promiscuously  in  the  water,  and  made  one  common 
mass.  Thirdly :  That  all  the  mass,  thus  sustained,  was  at 
length  precipitated  to  the  bottom ;  and  that  according  to  the 
laws  of  gravity  the  heaviest  settled  first,  and  the  rest  in  order. 
And  that  the  matters  thus  subsiding,  constituted  the  several 
strata  of  stone,  earth,  coal,  &c.  Fourthly :  That  these  strata 
were  originally  all  parallel,  even,  and  regular,  and  rendered 
the  surface  of  the  earth  perfectly  spherical ;  and  that  the 
whole  mass  of  water  lay  upon  them,  and  constituted  a  fluid 
sphere  compassing  the  globe.  Fifthly :  That  after  some 
time,  by  the  force  of  an  agent  §eate<J  within  the  earth,  these 


THEORIES   AND    FACTS    CONSIDERED.  145 

strata  were  broken  on  all  sides  of  the  globe,  and  their  situa- 
tion varied ;  being  elevated  in  some  places,  and  depressed  in 
others ;  whence  mountains,  valleys,  grottos,  etc.,  with  the 
channel  of  the  sea,  islands,  etc.  In  one  word,  the  whole  ter- 
raqueous globe  was  put,  by  this  disruption  and  dislocation 
of  the  strata,  into  the  condition  in  which  we  now  behold  it. 
Sixthly  :  That  upon  the  first  disruption  of  the  strata,  and 
the  depression  of  some  and  elevation  of  other  part:?,  which 
happened  towards  the  end  of  the  deluge,  the  mass  of  water 
fell  back  again  into  the  depressed  and  lowest  parts  of  the 
earth,  into  lakes  and  other  cavities,  and  the  channel  of  the 
ocean,  and  through  the  fissures,  whereby  this  communicates 
with  the  abyss,  which  it  filled  until  it  came  to  an  equilibrium 
with  the  ocean." 

After  having  given  you  this  cited  account  of  Woodward's 
theory  —  for  doing  which  you  will  be  better  able  fully  to  ap- 
preciate the  reason  after  a  while  than  now  —  it  will  be  expe- 
dient for  us  to  lay  before  you,  from  the  same  source,  a  few 
sentences  setting  forth  some  of  its  objectionable  features  :  — 
"  To  this  system  it  has  been  objected,  that  it  is  absurd  to 
suppose  that  before  the  deluge  there  were  no  mountains,  since 
we  are  expressly  told  that  the  waters  rose  fifteen  cubits  above 
the  tops  of  the  highest  mountains  ;  on  the  other  hand,  it  is 
not  said  that  the  waters  destroyed  or  dissolved  the  mountains. 
On  the  contrary,  the  mountains  remained  firm  in  their 
original  situation,  and  the  ark  rested  upon  that  eminence 
which  was  first  deserted  by  the  waters.  Besides ;  —  it  can- 
not be  reasonably  imagined  that  during  the  short  time  of  the 
deluge,  the  waters  could  dissolve  the  mountains,  and  the 
whole  fabric  of  the  earth.  Can  we  suppose  that  in  the 
space  of  forty  days,  the  hardest  rocks  and  minerals  were  dis- 
solved by  simple  water,  and  yet  that  shells,  bones,  and  other 
productions  of  the  sea,  were  able  to  resist  a  menstruum  to 
which  the  most  solid  materials  had  yielded  ?  —  Dr.  "Woodward 
asserts  that  the  materials  of  the  different  strata  are  arranged 


146  INQUIRY    AS    TO    PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE  : 

according  to  their  specific  gravities.  To  this  it  has  been 
objected  that  we  every  day  see  solid  rocks  placed  above  clay, 
sand,  pit-coal,  bitumen,  and  other  comparatively  light  bodies. 
If  indeed  it  were  uniformly  found,  through  the  whole  earth, 
that  the  upper  stratum  was  bitumen,  followed  successively  by 
strata  of  chalk,  marl,  clay,  sand,  stone,  marble,  and  metals,  it 
would  in  that  case  be  probable  that  all  these  materials  had 
been  precipitated  at  once  ;  and  this,  Dr.  Woodward  confident- 
ly affirms.  Whereas,  the  most  superficial  observer  need  only 
open  his  eyes  to  convince  himself  that  heavy  strata  are  often 
found  above  light  ones ;  and,  consequently,  that  these  sedi- 
ments could  not  be  deposited  at  the  same  time,  but  must  have 
been  transported  and  deposited,  as  Mr.  Buffon  says,  by  the 
ocean  at  successive  periods." 

As  a  matter  of  history,  young  gentlemen,  you  may  feel  inter- 
ested in  knowing  that  this  notion,  a  prominent,  leading  one  in 
Dr.  Woodward's  theory,  and,  we.  may  add,  Dr.  Burnet's,  and 
some  others'  too,  of  a  dissolution  and  reconsolidation  of  the 
earth  at  the  deluge,  continued  to  be  a  .favorite  with  philoso- 
phers for  nearly  a  century.  Mr.  Catcott,  whose  Treatise  on 
the  Deluge  was  published  in  1761 — between  seventy  and 
eighty  years  after  Woodward's  work  appeared  —  not  only 
gave  a  prominent  place  in  it  to  the  hypothesis  of  the  Earth's 
dissolution  and  reconsolidation  at  the  time  of  the  Noachic 
inundation,  but  would  have  his  readers  believe  with  him, 
that  the  sacred  Scriptures  teach  this  doctrine.  After  quoting 
with  approbation  that  strange  idea  of  Hutchinson  in  his 
Moses's  Principia,  that  the  "  windows  of  heaven,"  mentioned 
in  the  account  of  the  Flood,  mean,  "  passages  of  the  airs  " 
through  the  cracks  in  the  earth's  crust,  he  remarks :  "  As 
there  are  other  texts  which  mention  the  dissolution  of  the 
earth,  it  may  be  proper  to  cite  them.  (Ps.  46  :  2,)  '  God  is 
our  refuge  —  therefore  will  not  we  fear  though  the  earth  be 
removed,'  (Hebrew,  bemot,  be  changed,  be  quite  altered  as  it 
was  at  the  deluge.)  Sixth  verse :  '  He  uttered  his  voice, 


THEORIES    AND    FACTS    CONSIDERED.  147 

the  earth  melted]  (flowed,  dissolved  to  atoms.)  Again,  (Job 
28 :  9,  10,)  *  He  putteth  forth  his  hand  '  (the  expansion,  his 
instrument  or  the  agent  by  which  he  worked)  *  upon  the 
rock ;  he  overturneth  the  mountains  by  the  roots  ;  he  caused 
the  rivers  to  burst  forth  from  between  the  rocks'  (or  broke 
open  the  fountains  of  the  abyss).  '  His  eye '  (symbolically 
placed  for  the  light)  ( saw '  (passed  through  or  between) 
1  every  minute  thing '  (every  atom,  and  so  dissolved  the 
whole).  'He  (at  last)  bound  up  the  waters  from  weeping' 
(that  is,  from  passing  through  the  shell  of  the  earth,  as  tears 
make  their  way  through  the  orb  of  the  eye ;  or  as  it  is  re- 
lated, Gen.  8 :  2,  He  stopped  the  fountains  of  the  abyss  and 
the  windows  of  heaven).  'And  brought  out  the  light  from 
its  hiding-place '  (i,  e.,  from  the  inward  parts  of  the  earth 
from  between  every  atom,  where  it  lay  hid,  and  kept  each 
atom  separate  from  the  other,  and  so  the  whole  in  a  state  of 
dissolution  ;  his  bringing  out  those  parts  of  the  light  which 
caused  the  dissolution  would  of  course  permit  the  agents  to 
act  in  their  usual  way,  and  so  reform  the  earth.)" 

You  see,  young  gentlemen,  the  kind  of  Scripture  proof 
which  Catcott  brings.  You  may  scarcely  be  able  to  keep 
your  minds  from  harboring  the  idea  that  the  interpretation 
was  constructed  to  suit  a  favorite  theory ;  nor  find  it  remark- 
ably easy  to  keep  wonder  out  of  them  how  such  an  exegesis 
could  satisfy  any  able  or  respectable  mind  that  the  Sacred 
Scriptures  do  teach  what  they  are  here  produced  to  estab- 
lish. 

Some  philosophers  or  theorists  who  accorded  in  opinion 
with  Burnet  as  to  the  existence,  beneath  the  crust  of  the 
earth,  of  a  vast  abyss  of  waters,  did  not  resort  to  or  fix  upon 
precisely  the  same  means  that  he  did  for  bringing  those 
waters  upward  and  outward  so  as  to  cause  a  deluge,  or  sub- 
mergence of  the  outer  crust,  its  dissolution,  and  the  mingling 
of  the  innumerable  particles  which  had  composed  it  with  the 
before  living  things  which  had  existed  on  the  exterior  crus 


148  INQUIRY   AS    TO    PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE. 

and  in  the  interior  abyss.  Catcott  resorted  to  a  pressure  of 
the  air  on  the  crust's  surface,  so  as  to  force  out  the  liquid 
store  from  its  subterraneous  repository.  Some  others,  to 
caloric,  causing  an  expansion  of  the  waters  of  the  abyss,  and 
consequently  a  pressing  and  rising  of  them  upward,  thus 
shattering  the  crust,  or  dissolving  it  by  passing  through  the 
pores  :  Such  heat  reaching  the  water  of  the  great  abyss  from 
the  crust  that  had  been  long  and  powerfully  operated  on  by 
the  sun's  rays,  or  else  from  the  solid  nucleus  beneath.  For 
illustration  on  this  point  we  might  refer  you  to  some  curious 
calculations  made  by  Sir  Henry  Englefield,  to  show  how  a 
slight  expansion  of  the  waters,  conceived  to  have  place  with- 
in the  globe,  might  produce  a  general  deluge.  He  assumes 
that  the  solid  crust  of  the  globe  is  1000  miles  thick ;  and 
that  beneath  this  is  an  abyss  of  waters  2000  miles  thick ; 
leaving  a  solid  central  nucleus  2000  miles  in  diameter,  i.  e., 
1000  miles  each  side  of  the  centre  of  the  nucleus.  Assuming 
that  the  temperature  of  the  whole  globe,  before  the  deluge, 
was  50°  Fahrenheit,  and  that  from  some  cause  it  was 
suddenly  raised  to  83°,  he  finds,  since  water  expands  one 
twenty-fifth  of  its  bulk  from  freezing  to  boiling,  that  this  in- 
crease of  heat  would  be  sufficient  to  deluge  the  earth.  If  the 
cause  of  the  elevation  of  the  temperature  were  then  removed, 
the  waters  would  contract  to  their  original  bulk,  and  leave 
the  continents  again  dry. 


EVENING   ELEVENTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN  : 

Instead  of  one  vast  subterraneous  abyss,  many  philosophic 
theorists  have  preferred  to  substitute  a  large  number  of  in- 
ferior abysses  in  the  earth's  interior,  and  these  abysses 
communicating  with  seas  of  greater  or  less  dimensions  on 
its  surface.  Then  to  bring  these  waters,  with  their  living 
tenants,  forth  from  those  abysses  and  seas  on  to  the  dry  land, 
for  the  purpose  of  effecting  a  general  submergence  of  the 
latter,  different  means  have  been  imaginatively  resorted  to. 
Dr.  Halley's  resort  was  to  the  appulse  or  impingement  of  a 
comet,  causing  an  instantaneous  change  in  the  polar  and  diur- 
nal rotation  of  the  globe.  The  great  agitation  that  must  have 
been  thus  occasioned  would  force  the  waters  from  their 
previous  repositories  upon  the  dry  land,  and,  as  he  observes, 
among  other  things,  would  be  sufficient  to  account  for  all 
those  strange  appearances  of  heaping  vast  quantities  of  earth 
and  high  cliffs  upon  beds  of  shells  which  were  previously  in 
the  abysses  and  seas,  and  raising  up  mountains  where  none 
antecedently  existed.  Mr.  Wm.  Whiston,  who  published 
his  "New  Theory  of  the  Earth"  in  1696,  has  an  ingenious 
hypothesis,  similar  to  that  of  Dr.  Halley,  with  respect  to  the 
primary  cause  of  the  deluge,  but  much  more  largely  applied 
and  explained.  He  shows,  from  several  remarkable  coinci- 
dences, that  a  comet,  descending  in  the  plane  of  the  ecliptic 


150  INQUIRY   AS    TO    PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE: 

towards  its  perihelion,  passed  just  before  the  earth  on  the 
first  day  of  the  deluge ;  the  consequences  of  which  would  be, 
first,  that  this  comet,  when  it  came  below  the  moon,  would 
raise  a  prodigiously  vast  and  strong  tide,  both  in  the  small 
seas  which,  according  to  this  hypothesis,  were  in  the  antedi- 
luvian earth,  —  for  he  allowed  no  great  ocean  there,  as  in 
ours,  —  and  in  the  subterraneous  abyss;  and  that  this  tide 
would  rise  and  increase  all  the  time  of  the  approach  of  the 
comet  towards  the  earth,  and  would  be  at  its  greatest  height 
when  the  comet  was  at  its  least  distance  from  it.  By  the 
force  of  this  tide,  and  also  by  the  attraction  of  the  comet,  he 
judges  that  the  abyss  must  put  on  an  elliptic,  or  rather  an 
exactly  oval  figure,  whose  surface  being  considerably  larger 
than  the  former  spherical  one,  the  outward  crust  of  the  earth, 
incumbent  on  the  abyss,  must  accommodate  itself  to  that 
figure,  which  it  could  not  do  while  it  remained  solid  and 
conjoined.  He  concludes,  therefore,  that  it  must  of  necessity 
be  extended,  and  at  last  broken,  by  the  violence  of  the  said 
tides  and  attraction ;  and  have  innumerable  fissures  made 
quite  through  it,  out  of  which  the  included  water  issuing,  was 
a  great  means  of  the  flood ;  this  answering  to  what  Moses 
speaks  of  "  the  fountains  of  the  great  deep  being  broken  up." 
Again ;  the  same  comet,  he  shows,  in  its  descent  towards  the 
sun,  must  have  passed  so  close  by  the  body  of  the  earth  as  to 
involve  it  in  its  atmosphere  and  tail  for  a  considerable  time ; 
and,  of  consequence,  it  must  have  left  a  vast  quantity  of  its 
vapors,  both  expanded  and  condensed,  on  its  surface ;  a  great 
part  of  which,  being  rarefied  by  the  solar  heat,  would  be 
drawn  up  again  into  the  atmosphere,  and  afterward  descend 
in  violent  rains  upon  the  earth :  and  this  he  takes  to  be  what 
Moses  intimates  by  "  the  windows  of  heaven  being  opened," 
and  particularly  by  the  forty  days'  rain. 

It  may  be  proper  to  remark  —  what  appears  fatal  to  the 
cometic  hypothesis  both  of  Halley  and  Whiston  —  that  their 
main  instrument  has  been  since  shown  a  very  insufficient 


THEORIES   AND    FACTS    CONSIDERED.  151 

one  to  produce  the  effects  which  they  attribute  to  it :  we  al- 
lude to  the  ascertainment,  by  comparatively  recent  observa- 
tions, of  the  fact  that  certainly  some  and  probably  all  comets 
consist  of  matter  so  attenuated  that  were  this  earthy  ball  to 
come  into  direct  collision  with  oner  it  is  doubtful  whether  we 
should  be  conscious  of  it.  Dr.  Hitchcock,  quoting  from 
WhewelPs  Bridgewater  Treatise,  says,  "  They  have  no  more 
solidity  or  coherence  than  a  cloud  of  dust  or  a  wreath  of 
smoke,  through  which  the  stars  are  visible  with  no  perceptible 
diminution  of  their  brightness.  These  discoveries,  admitted 
now  by  the  ablest  astronomers,  have  doubtless  given  the 
final  quietus  to  this  cometic  theory  of  the  deluge ;  though  we 
perceive  that  some  geologists  on  the  continent  still  cling  to 
this  hypothesis."  (Biblical  Repository,  volume  9,  p.  108.) 

Ray,  an  eminent  naturalist,  and  a  contemporary  of  Burnet 
and  Whiston,  had  recourse  to  the  hypothesis  of  a  shifting  of 
the  centre  of  gravity  of  the  earth  ;  somewhat  after  the  manner 
in  which  Dr.  Halley  explains  magnetism  by  a  mass  of  me- 
tallic iron  in  the  earth,  which  has  a  revolution  distinct  from 
that  of  the  earth,  and  is  of  irregular  form.  As  the  attracting 
centre  changed,  it  would  cause  the  waters  successively  to 
deluge  and  desert  the  different  parts  of  the  surface. 

The  author  of  the  article  in  the  Biblical  Repository  from 
whicfy.  we  recently  quoted,  gives  the  name  of  a  distinguished 
professor  of  our  own  day  who  has  suggested  the  following 
ingenious  hypothesis,  to  bring  the  waters  of  the  earth's 
abysses  over  the  dry  land.  He  supposes  "  vast  galvanic  ar- 
rangements to  exist  in  the  bowels  of  the  earth,  which  might 
have  generated  vast  quantities  of  hydrogen,  oxygen,  and  car- 
bonic acid  by  decomposition,  and  that  these  gases,  occupying 
the  upper  portions  of  subterranean  cavities,  would,  as  they 
accumulated,  force  the  waters  out,  and  cause  them  gradually 
to  overflow  the  land,  but  after  their  escape  the  waters  would 
flow  back  again  into  these  internal  reservoirs." 

It  is  hoped  that  your  large  stock  of  patience  will  not  become 


152  INQUIRY   AS   TO   PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE: 

entirely  exhausted  if  we  hint  at  another  hypothesis.  It  is 
one  which  has  been  much  in  vogue,  and  has  received  coun- 
tenance from  several  able  geologists.  This  hypothesis  em- 
braces the  supposition  that  the  sea,  (taking  this  last  term  in  a 
collective  sense,)  and  the  land  changed  places  at  the  Noach- 
ian  Deluge  ;  —  that  our  present  continents,  by"  earthquakes," 
"subterraneous  fires,"  "volcanic  agency"  —  each  of  these 
forms  of  expression  has  by  different  writers  been  used — 
were  raised  up  from  their  before  humble  position  beneath  the 
primitive  ocean,  and  the  contents  of  the  latter,  at  that  time 
and  by  that  means,  poured  over  upon  the  previously  dry 
land.  Hooke,  as  appears  from  his  "  Discourse  of  Earth- 
quakes," published  in  his  Posthumous  Works  at  the  begin- 
ning of  the  eighteenth  century,  embraced  this  idea.  "  During 
the  great  catastrophe,"  says  he,  "  there  might  have  been  a 
changing  of  that  part  which  was  before  dry  land  into  sea  by 
sinking,  and  of  that  which  was  sea  into  dry  land  by  raising, 
and  marine  bodies  might  have  been  buried  in  sediment  be- 
neath the  ocean  in  the  interval  between  the  Creation  and  the 
Deluge."  Toward  the  close  of  the  same  century  we  find 
M.  DeLuc,  Professor  of  Philosophy  and  Geology  at  Gottin- 
gen,  embracing  and  defending,  for  the  most  part,  these  views : 
We  say,  for  the  most  part  —  for  he  differed  from  Hooke  in 
supposing  all  the  fossiliferous  strata,  so  far  as  he  had  any 
understanding  of  them,  to  have  been  deposited  during  the 
period  of  the  deluge  itself.  (See  DeLuc's  Letters  on  the 
Physical  History  of  the  Earth).  So  late  as  within  the  last 
half  century  —  we  might  say  the  last  thirty  or  thirty-five 
years,  two  works  have  appeared  from  English  authors  —  lit- 
erary or  theoretic  rather  than  scientific  or  practical  geologists 
—  defending  the  hypothesis  substantially  set  forth  by  Hooke. 
We  allude  to  Granville  Penn  and  George  Fairholme,  Esqs. 
These  writers  suppose  the  primary  rocks  to  have  been 
created  just  as  we  find  them,  for  the  original  framework 
of  the  globe.  The  secondary  rocks  they  maintain  were  de- 


THEORIES  AND  FACTS  CONSIDERED.        153 

posited  between  the  Creation  and  the  Deluge ;  and  the 
tertiary  strata,  along  with  the  diluvial,  by  the  Deluge.  This 
theory  of  course  requires  us  to  suppose  that  the  antedilu- 
vian continents  were  sunk  beneath  the  ocean  at  the  deluge, 
and  our  present  ones  were  then  raised  above  the  waters. 

There  is  a  theory  relating  to  the  Mosaic  Flood's  occurrence 
which  appears  to  we  know  not  how  many,  very  plausible. 
It  has  a  resemblance  in  one  of  its  features  to  the  last  men- 
tioned. The  theory  to  which  we  refer,  supposes  the  bed  of 
some  ocean  to  have  been  by  volcanic  agency  elevated ;  that 
the  waters  of  said  ocean  with  their  living  contents  were  thus 
.  thrown  over  the  adjoining  territories ;  and  that  the  mighty 
wave  thus  produced  would  not  stop  till  it  had  swept  over  all 
the  continents  and  islands.  "Whilst  this  theory  has  the  ad- 
vantage of  requiring  less  water  than  most  if  not  all  of  the 
other  theories  mentioned,  to  bring  about  a  general  submer- 
sion, it  is  liable  to  an  objection  which  has  been  indeed  urged 
against  it,  to  wit,  that  all  parts  of  the  earth  could  not  have 
thus  been  enveloped  simultaneously ;  that  the  territory  first 
inundated  must  have  been  left  dry  ere  the  wave  had  reached 
other  portions  of  the  continents.  And  an  additional  objection 
has  been  urged :  that  such  a  violent  rushing  of  waters  over 
the  land  as  would  thus  be  caused,  appears  unlike  the  scrip- 
tural account,  and  would  seem  greatly  to  imperil  the  ark, 
with  both  its  human  and  sub-human  tenantry. 

As  to  most  if  not  all  of  the  theorists  to  whose  views  we 
have  been  adverting,  there  manifestly  prevailed  in  their 
mind  a  full  and  firm  belief  in  the  truth  of  the  Mosaic  record 
contained  in  the  seventh  and  eighth  chapters  of  Genesis ; 
and,  understanding  somewhat  concerning  the  spread  and  de- 
position of  marine  as  well  as  other  fossil  organic  remains, 
and  being  entirely  at  a  loss  how  to  account  for  such  diffusion 
and  deposit  in  consentaneousness  with  their  apprehensions 
of  the  teachings  of  the  earliest  portion  of  sacred  history, 
they  referred  these  phenomena,  in  the  manner  we  have  seen, 
to  the  Flood  of  Noah. 


154  INQUIRY   AS    TO   PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE: 

Such  has  been  the  advance  of  geological  science  within 
the  last  half  century  ;  such  the  results  of  extensive  and  un- 
tiring investigation,  during  this  period,  in  that  line — that  a 
writer  can  no  longer  be  considered  as  moving  his  pen  intelli- 
gently, who  ascribes  the  formation  of  the  earth's  fossiliferous 
strata,  either  in  whole  or  in  part,  to  the  Noachian  deluge. 
The  time,  we  are  aware,  has  been,  when  such  a  declaration 
as  this  last  would  have  been  accounted  tantamount  to  an  ab- 
negation of  the  truth  of  the  Mosaic  writings.  After  our 
former  averments,  it  seems  hardly  necessary  to  affirm,  in  a 
formal  manner,  our  full  and  unwavering  belief  in  the  authen- 
ticity and  divine  inspiration  of  every  part  and  parcel  of  our 
Canonical  Scriptures.  We  hope  we  shall  not  be  understood 
as  asserting  our  firm  belief  in  the  correctness  of  every  one's 
interpretation  of  every  part  of  our  sacred  volume.  On  the 
contrary,  we  are  constrained  to  believe  that  the  very  first 
verse  of  the  Bible,  and  the  second,  have,  in  a  chronological 
respect  at  least,  not  escaped  misinterpretation.  In  regard 
to  this  we  may  have  occasion  to  say  a  few  words  hereafter. 

About  to  lay  before  you  certain  facts,  let  us  premise,  that 

—  a   thing   indeed   hinted    at  in   the    preceding    Exercise 

—  the  idea  formerly  entertained  by  large  numbers,  and  still 
by  some,  that  all  the  rocks  composing  the  earth's  crust,  in- 
clusive of  their  contents,  were  by  the  Omnipotent  created 
just  as  we  now  meet  them  ;  and  that  the  supposed  remains  of 
animals  and  plants,  fauna  and  flora,  which  a  not  inconsider- 
able portion  of  them  contain,  and  which  occur  in  all  states  or 
stages  from   a  comparatively  slight  change  to  a  complete 
conversion  into  stone,  were  never  real  animals  and  plants, 
but  only  resemblances,   is  advocated   by  no  man  who  with 
science  and  care  has  examined  rocks  and  organic  remains. 
Every  scrutinizing  and  candid  observer  has  had  forced  upon 
him  the  conclusion  that  the  former  of  these,  so  far  as  the  crust 
of  the  globe  has  been  explored,  to  the  depth  of  several  miles, 
have  been  the  result  of  second  causes  ;  that  is,  are  now  in  a 


THEORIES    AND    FACTS    CONSIDERED.  155 

different  state  from  that  in  which  they  were  originally  created  ; 
and  that  the  latter  are  the  remains  of  once  living  creatures. 
Proceed  now  we  shall  to  the  statement  of  the  few  facts  to 
which  we  made  allusion  —  observing,  that  important  aid  in 
the  presentation  of  them  is  derived  from  Dr.  Hitchcock's 
recent  work,  entitled  The  Religion  of  Geology. 

First.  The  fossiliferous  rocks,  or  such  as  contain  animals 
and  plants,  are  not  less  than  six  or  seven  miles  in  perpendicu- 
lar thickness,  and  are  composed  of  hundreds  and  thousands  of 
alternate  layers  of  different  kinds,  all  of  which  appear  to 
have  heen  deposited,  just  as  rocks  are  now  forming,  at  the 
bottom  of  lakes  and  seas  ;  and  hence  their  deposition  must 
have  occupied  an  immense  period  of  time.  The  process  of 
forming  rocks  by  the  accumulation  of  mud,  sand,  and  gravel,  is 
very  slow.  In  general,  such  accumulations  at  the  bottom  of 
lakes  and  the  ocean  do  not  increase  more  than  a  few  inches 
in  a  century.  It  is  certain  that  since  man  existed  on  the 
globe,  materials  for  the  production  of  rocks  have  not  accu- 
mulated to  the  average  density  of  more  than  from  one  hun- 
dred to  two  hundred  feet.  The  evidence  of  this  position  is, 
that  neither  the  works  nor  the  remains  of  man  have  been 
found  any  deeper  in  the  earth  than  in  the  upper  part  of  the 
superficial  deposit  called  alluvium.  Had  man  existed  while 
the  other  deposits  were  going  on,  no  possible  reason  can  be 
assigned  why  his  bones  and  the  fruits  of  his  labors  should 
not  be  found  mixed  with  those  of  other  animals,  so  abundant 
in  the  rocks  to  the  depth  of  six  or  seven  miles.  In  the  last 
six  thousand  years,  then,  only  one  six-hundredth  part  of  the 
stratified  rocks  would  seem  to  have  been  accumulated.  Even 
if  we  admit  that  this  deposition  progressed  in  particular  places 
much  faster  than  at  present,  a  variety  of  facts  forbids  the 
supposition  that  this  was  the  general  progressive  mode  of 
their  formation. 

Second.  During  the  deposition  of  the  stratified  rocks  (in 
the  larger  portion  of  which  fossil  organic  remains  are  found,) 


156  INQUIRY   AS    TO    PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE: 

a  great  number  of  changes  must  have  occurred  in  the  matter 
of  which  they  are  composed.  Hundreds  of  such  changes 
can  be  easily  counted,  and  they  often  imply  great  changes  in 
the  waters  holding  the  materials  in  solution  or  suspension ; 
such  changes  indeed  as  must  have  required  different  oceans 
over  the  same  spot.  Such  events  could  not  have  taken  place 
with  extensive  elevations  and  subsidences  of  the  earth's  crust, 
nor  could  such  vertical  movements  have  happened  without 
much  intervening  time,  as  numerous  facts  evince.  Here  we 
have  evidence  of  vast  periods  occupied  in  the  secondary  pro- 
duction and  arrangements  of  the  earth's  crust. 

Third.  The  remains  of  marine  and  other  animals  and 
plants,  found  in  the  earth,  are  not  mingled  confusedly  together, 
as  we  should  certainly  be  compelled  to  look  for,  had  they  been 
brought  over  the  land  promiscuously  by  a  deluge ;  but  are 
found  arranged,  for  the  most  part,  in  as  much  order  as  the 
drawers  of  a  well-regulated  cabinet ;  though,  by  the  way,  as 
the  celebrated  Hugh  Miller  has  shown,  not  so  as  to  confirm 
the  truth  of  the  "  development  hypothesis  "  set  forth  anew 
in  the  "  Vestiges  of  Creation"  but,  on  the  contrary,  after  the 
manner  to  confute  it.  In  general  those  animals  and  plants 
seem  to  have  lived  and  died  on  or  near  the  spots  where  they 
are  now  found ;  and  as  countless  millions  of  these  remains 
are  often  seen  piled  together,  so  as  to  form  almost  entire 
mountains,  the  periods  requisite  for  their  formation  must  have 
been  far  otherwise  than  short.  Could  they  have  been  in  dura- 
tion other  than  immensely  long  ? 

Fourth.  It  is  an  apparently  well-established  fact,  that  there 
have  been  upon  the  globe,  previous  to  the  existing  races,  not 
less  than  five  distinct  periods  of  organized  existence  ;  that  is, 
five  great  groups  of  animals  and  plants,  so  completely  in- 
dependent that  no  species  whatever  is  found  in  more  than 
one  of  them,  having  lived  and  successively  passed  away  before 
the  creation  of  the  races  which  now  occupy  the  surface.  Other 
standard  writers  make  the  number  of  these  periods  of  ex- 


THEORIES  AND  FACTS  CONSIDERED.        157 

istence  as  many  as  twelve.  Comparative  anatomy  testifies 
that  so  unlike  in  structure  were  these  different  groups,  that 
they  could  not  have  coexisted  in  the  same  climate  and  other 
external  circumstances. 

Fifth.  In  the  earliest  times  in  which  animals  and  plants 
lived,  the  climate  over  the  whole  globe  appears  to  have  been 
as  warm  as  it  is  now  between  the  tropics,  or  even  warmer. 
And  the  slow  change  from  warmer  to  colder  appears  to  have 
been  the  chief  cause  of  the  successive  destruction  of  the 
different  races ;  and  new  ones  were  created,  better  adapted 
to  the  altered  condition  of  the  globe ;  and  yet  each  group 
seems  to  have  occupied  the  globe  through  a  period  of  great 
length. 

Sixth.  Among  the  thirty  thousand  varieties  of  animals 
and  plants  found  in  the  rocky  strata,  very  few  living  species 
have  been  detected ;  and  even  these  few  occur  in  the  most 
recent  rocks ;  while  in  the  secondary  group,  not  less  than  six 
miles  thick,  not  a  single  species  now  on  the  globe  has  been 
discovered.  Hence  the  present  races  did  not  exist  till  after 
those  in  the  secondary  rocks  had  died.  No  human  remains 
have  been  found  below  those  alluvial  deposits  which  are  now 
forming  by  rivers,  lakes,  and  the  ocean.  Hence  it  is  to  be  in- 
ferred that  man  was  one  of  the  latest  creatures  that  was 
placed  on  the  globe. 

Seventh.  The  present  continents  of  the  globe,  with  perhaps 
the  exception  of  some  of  their  highest  mountains,  have,  for  a 
long  period,  constituted  the  bottom  of  the  ocean,  and  have 
been  subsequently  either  elevated  into  their  present  position, 
or  the  waters  have  been  drained  off  from  their  surface.  This, 
Dr.  Hitchcock  says,  though  regarded  with  much  skepticism 
by  many,  is  as  satisfactorily  proved  as  any  principle  of 
physical  science  not  resting  on  mathematical  demonstration. 
(See  Religion  of  Geology,  p.  21.) 

Now  if  all,  or  the  main  part,  of  what  we  have  been  just 
stating  as  facts,  be  such,  and  not  fancies,  —  and  eminent 


158  INQUIRY   AS    TO     PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE  : 

scientific  investigators  of  the  earth's  strata  —  numbers  of 
them,  too,  not  only  Christians,  but  Christian  divines  —  unite 
in  the  opinion  that  they  are  demonstrable  and  manifest  facts, 
—  what  is  the  conclusion  to  be  drawn  from  them,  touching 
the  point  before  us  ?  Who  that  receive  them  as  real  and 
true,  thoroughly  weigh  them,  and  compare  them  with  the 
memorable  diluvial  event  described  by  the  sacred  historian ; 
its  comparatively  recent  occurrence ;  its  transient  character, 
being  in  all  but  of  three  hundred  and  seventy -five  days'  con- 
tinuance ;  and  other  characteristics,  as  set  forth  in  the  seventh 
and  eighth  chapters  of  Genesis,  can  ascribe  the  formation  of 
the  earth's  fossiliferous  strata,  in  whole  or  in  part,  to  the 
Noachian  deluge  ?  Will  not  such  feel  themselves  constrained 
to  infer,  that  the  fossil  organic  remains  imbedded  in  the  rocky 
strata  of  the  earth's  crust,  are  not  to  be  regarded  as  present- 
ing traces  of  the  cataclysm  described  by  Moses  ? 

Let  us  next  proceed  to  inquire  whether,  in  the  drift  or 
alluvium  above,  there  may  not  be  discovered  indisputable 
traces  of  the  Noachic  catastrophe.  So  it  used  to  be  very 
commonly  thought.  We  can  spend  but  a  short  time  in  ex- 
amining whether  this  opinion  is  or  is  not  correct.  Here 
allow  me  to  remark  that,  if  you  will  look  into  Dr.  Buckland's 
Reliquiae  Diluviance,  published  in  1823,  you  will  see  that  that 
eminent  geologist,  when  he  penned  that  work,  thought  that 
there  were  on  the  present  surface  of  the  earth  discoverable 
and  decisive  effects  of  the  diluvial  waters.  As  an  item  in 
proof,  let  me  read  the  following  single  sentence,  found  on 
page  237 :  — "  An  agent  thus  gigantic  appears  to  have 
operated  universally  on  the  surface  of  our  planet  at  the 
period  of  the  deluge ;  the  spaces  then  laid  bare  by  the 
sweeping  away  of  the  solid  materials  that  had  before  filled 
them,  are  called  Valleys  of  Denudation ;  and  the  effects  we 
see  produced  by  the  water  in  the  minor  cases  I  have  just 
mentioned,  by  presenting  us  an  example  within  tangible 
limits,  prepare  us  to  comprehend  the  mighty  and  stupendous 


THEORIES    AND    FACTS    CONSIDERED.  159 

magnitude  of  those  forces  by  which  whole  strata  were  swept 
away,  and  valleys  laid  open,  and  gorges  excavated  in  the 
more  solid  portions  of  the  substance  of  the  earth,  bearing  the 
same  proportion  to  the  overwhelming  ocean  by  which  they 
were  produced,  that  modern  ravines  on  the  sides  of  mountains 
bear  to  the  torrents  which,  since  the  retreat  of  the  deluge, 
have  created  and  continue  to  enlarge  them."  Dr.  Buckland 
wrote  this  passage  after  exploring  the  drift  or,  as  it  was 
usually  called,  diluvium  of  the  British  Isles,  and  in  reference 
to  the  results  of  his  observations.  That  celebrated  palaeontol- 
ogist, Baron  Cuvier,  —  who  had  remarked,  that  he  "thought, 
with  DeLuc  and  Dolomieu,  that  if  there  be  any  thing  settled 
in  geology,  it  is  this,  that  the  surface  of  our  globe  has  been 
subjected  to  a  great  and  sudden  revolution,  the  date  of  which 
cannot  be  carried  much  farther  back  than  five  or  six  thousand 
years,"  —  speaking  of  the  mud,  gravel,  and  bones  of  the  Kirk- 
dale  caves,  proceeds  thus  :  —  "  Most  carefully  described  by 
Prof.  Buckland,  under  the  name  of  diluvium,  and  exceedingly 
different  from  those  other  beds  of  similarly  rolled  materials, 
which  are  constantly  deposited  by  torrents  and  rivers,  and 
contain  only  the  bones  of  animals  existing  in  the  country,  and 
to  which  Mr.  Buckland  gives  the  name  of  alluvium;  they 
now  form,  in  the  eyes  of  all  geologists,  the  fullest  proof  to  the 
senses,  of  that  immense  inundation  which  came  last  in  the 
catastrophes  of  our  globe."  (Discours  sur  les  Revolutions 
de  la  surface  du  globe,  etc.,  p.  141.) 

In  his  Bridgewater  Treatise,  published  in  1836,  Dr. 
Buckland  lets  us  know  that  he  had  abandoned  the  opinion 
advanced  and  argued  in  his  Reliquice,  respecting  the  geolo- 
gical evidence  of  a  deluge,  so  far  as  relates  to  the  Noachian. 
His  language  on  page  94  of  that  Treatise  is :  —  "  Discoveries 
which  have  been  made  since  the  publication  of  this  work, 
(the  Reliquiae  Diluviana?,)  show  that  many  of  the  animals 
therein  described,  existed  during  more  than  one  geological 
period  preceding  the  catastrophe  by  which  they  were  extir- 


160  INQUIRY   AS    TO    PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE. 

pated.  Hence  it  seems  more  probable  that  the  event  in 
question  was  the  last  of  the  many  geological  revolutions  that 
have  been  produced  by  violent  irruptions  of  water,  rather 
than  the  comparatively  tranquil  inundation  described  in  the 
Inspired  Narrative.  It  has  been  justly  argued,  against  the 
attempt  to  identify  these  two  great  historical  and  natural 
phenomena,  that,  as  the  rise  and  fall  of  the  waters  of  the 
Mosaic  deluge  are  described  to  have  been  gradual  and  of 
short  duration,  they  would  have  produced  comparatively  little 
change  on  the  surface  of  the  country  they  overflowed." 

Arguments  to  sustain  the  affirmative  of  the  question,  —  Is 
there  geological  evidence  of  an  extensive  deluge,  (the  Noachian 
is  not  specified,)  since  the  earth  assumed  essentially  its  present 
form  ?  —  you  may  find  adduced  in  the  tenth  volume  of  the 
Biblical  Repository,  pp.  335-374.  Justice  could  not  be  done 
either  to  that  side  of  the  question,  or  to  that  article,  by  at- 
tempting a  synopsis.  It  is  hoped  that  you  all  will,  at  the 
earliest  opportunity,  read  it  in  toto  for  yourselves.  And  here 
suffer  -me  also  to  recommend  the  perusal  ot  that  work  of  Dr. 
Buckland,  lately  referred  to  —  his  Reliquiae  Diluvianae.  It 
will  bring  you  to  an  acqaintance  with  some  interesting 
phenomena,  to  what  cause  or  causes  soever  they  may  justly 
be  attributed. 


EVENING    TWELFTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

In  support  of  the  position  that  most  of  the  cases  of  accu- 
mulations of  drift,  the  dispersion  of  bowlders,  and  the  polish 
and  striae  of  the  rocks  in  place,  occurred  prior  to  man's  ex- 
istence upon  the  globe,  and  cannot  have  been  the  result  of 
Noah's  deluge,  allow  me  to  give  you  an  abstract  of  a  few 
arguments,  which  you  may  find  more  fully  presented  in  Dr. 
Pye  Smith's  "  Scripture  and  Geology,"  Lecture  Fifth ;  and 
Dr.  Hitchcock's  "  Religion  of  Geology,"  parts  of  Lectures 
First,  Second,  and  Fourth. 

First.  Since  the  geological  period  now  passing  com- 
menced, called  the  alluvial  or  pleistocene  period,  certain 
changes  have  been  going  on  which  indicate  a  very  great  an- 
tiquity to  the  drift  period.  Instance  the  formation  of  deltas 
and  terraces.  Of  deltas  take  a  single  example.  The  amount 
of  sediment  which  is  carried  down  the  Mississippi  and  de- 
posited yearly,  is  at  such  a  rate  as  to  have  required  14,200 
years  to  form  the  whole  delta  in  the  manner  it  exists.  As  to 
terraces,  they  occur  along  some  of  the  rivers  of  this  and  other 
countries  from  400  to  500  feet  above  their  present  beds,  and 
around  our  lakes  to  the  height  of  nearly  1000  feet.  Yet 
scarcely  anywhere,  since  the  memory  of  man,  have  even  the 
lowest  of  these  terraces  been  formed,  save  on  a  very  limited 
scale,  and  of  a  few  feet  in  height. 


162  THE    FORE-MENTIONED    FACTS 

Second.  The  organic  remains  found  in  the  alluvium  con- 
siderably above  the  drift,  are  many  of  them  of  extinct  species. 
Now  the  presumption  is,  that  extinct  animals  and  plants 
belong  to  a  creation  anterior  to  man,  especially  if  they 
exhibit  a  tropical  character  —  as  those  do  which  are  usually 
assigned  to  the  drift,  —  since  we  have  no  evidence  of  a 
tropical  climate  in  northern  latitudes  until  we  get  back  to  a 
period  far  anterior  to  man. 

Third.  No  remains  of  man  or  his  works  have  been  found 
in  drift,  nor  indeed  till  we  rise  almost  to  the  top  of  the  allu- 
vial deposit.  Even  ancient  Armenia,  says  Dr.  Hitchcock, 
has  now  been  examined  geologically  with  sufficient  care  to 
make  it  almost  certain  that  human  remains  do  not  exist  there 
in  drift,  if  drift  is  found  there  at  all. 

Fourth.  The  agency  producing  drift  must  have  operated 
during  a  vastly  longer  period  than  the  three  hundred  and 
seventy-five  days  of  Noah's  Flood.  It  could  be  shown  that 
extensive  erosions  which  are  referable  to  that  agency,  and 
the  huge  masses  of  detritus  which  have  been  the  result,  must 
have  demanded  centuries  and  even  decades  of  them.  Nor 
will  any  supposed  increase  of  power  in  the  agency  explain 
the  results,  without  admitting  a  long  period  for  their  action. 

Fifth.  In  the  Noachian  deluge,  water  appears  to  have 
been  the  principal  agent ;  but  in  the  production  of  drift,  ice 
was  at  least  equally  concerned. 

If  you  all  have  not  those  works  in  your  possession  to  which 
reference  has  been  made  relative  to  this  subject,  you  may  see 
some  of  these  facts,  the  last  among  the  rest,  set  forth  in  Mrs. 
Somerville's  Physical  Geography  —  the  latter  part  of  first 
and  second  chapters. 

In  the  light  of  such  facts  as  those  which  have  been  now 
stated  —  if  facts  they  be  — how  untenable  appears  the  notion 
that  even  the  drift  exhibits  distinguishable  traces  of  Noah's 
deluge. 

Had  you,  young  gentlemen,  never  had  any  previous  intima- 


AND    GEN.    1  :    1,   2    NOT    IN    CONFLICT.  163 

tion  respecting  these  facts,  together  with  those  relative  to  the 
fossiliferous  strata,  presented  in  the  preceding  Exercise ;  and 
had  you  known  naught  about  any  interpretation  of  the  first 
part  of  Genesis  other  than  what  has  been  (though  we  are  in- 
clined to  think  incorrectly)  denominated  the  more  literal,  and 
certainly  until  of  late  has  been  the  more  common,  you  would 
probably  feel  alarmed  at  the  apparent  discrepancy  between 
these  facts  and  the  Mosaic  history  in  regard  to  the  time,  etc., 
of  this  world's  creation.  Ere  proceeding  farther  in  the  direct 
consideration  of  the  Noachic  deluge,  it  is  not  only  proper,  but 
a  regard  for  sacred  truth  demands,  that  we  should  first  show 
that  no  real  discrepancy  exists  between  the  facts  brought  to 
view  and  the  averments  of  the  inspired  historian  at  the  com- 
mencement of  the  book  of  Genesis.  "  In  the  beginning  God 
created  the  heaven  and  the  earth."  Here  are  taught  two 
things :  First,  That  "  the  heaven  and  the  earth  "  had  a  "  be- 
ginning"—  were  not  from  everlasting.  Secondly,  That  they 
had  their  beginning  from  "God"  —  not  from  chance  —  not 
from  any  source  beside  him.  No  indication  is  to  be  discerned 
in  that  first  verse,  in  regard  to  the  chronology  of  "  the  begin- 
ning "  there  spoken  of.  Those  interpreters  who  have  made 
it  belong  to  the  first  of  the  six  geogonic  days  —  the  beginning 
of  the  first  of  those  days,  —  and  who  understand  the  work 
there  summarily  described,  to  be  that  of  the  primary  part  of 
the  first  day,  have  had  no  sufficient  authority  for  so  doing. 
And  the  formal  announcement  contained  in  the  second  verse 
appears  plainly  to  show  that  the  archaic  writer  did  not  mean 
to  have  it  understood  that  no  interval  passed  between  the 
transaction  recorded  in  the  first  verse  and  that  of  which  men- 
tion is  made  in  the  third.  The  history  of  the  six  days'  work, 
the  best  biblical  expositors  now  consider  to  commence  with 
the  last  named  verse.  The  language  of  Moses  indisputably 
will  allow  an  indefinite  interval  to  have  elapsed  between  the 
transaction  related  in  the  first  verse  and  what  is  narrated  in 
the  third  and  succeeding  verses  of  the  chapter.  Such  an 


164  THE    FORE-MENTIONED    FACTS 

interpretation  appears  to  us  the  more  rational,  apart  from  all 
consideration  of  the  interesting  principles  or  facts  brought  to 
light  and  established  by  modern  geological  investigation.  It 
certainly  dissipates  all  semblance  of  collision  between  geology 
and  revelation  in  regard  to  the  period  of  this  planet's  exist- 
ence. It  gives  the  geologist  full  scope  for  his  largest  specu- 
lations concerning  the  age  of  the  world.  It  permits  him  to 
maintain  that  its  primary  condition  was  as  unlike  to  the 
present  as  appearances  allow  him  to  infer ;  and  affords  him 
time  enough  for  all  the  mutations  of  mineral  constitution  and 
organic  life  which  its  strata  are  thought  to  reveal.  It  sup- 
poses all  these  passed  over  sub  silentio  by  the  sacred  penman, 
because  irrelevant  to  the  object  of  revelation  :  What  is  de- 
clared in  the  first  verse  and  the  second  being  deemed  all  that 
it  was  requisite  to  state  respecting  what  transpired  anterior  to 
the  work  of  the  six  geogonic  days. 

You  are  aware  that  the  interpretation  of  the  first  part  of 
Genesis,  of  which  we  have  spoken,  is  not  a  novel  or  unheard 
of  one.  Besides  what  Dr.  Pye  Smith  relates  in  regard  to  the 
views  of  certain  biblical  expositors  who  lived  before  geology, 
as  a  science,  had  an  existence,  such  as  Justin  Martyr,  Gregory 
Nazianzen,  Basil,  Origen,  Theodoret,  and  Augustin,  it  seems 
to  us  proper,  and  for  some  reasons  expedient,  to  refer  to  the 
opinions  of  some  distinguished  biblical  interpreters  of  modern 
times.  "  By  the  phrase,  '  in  the  beginning,' "  says  Doeder- 
lin,  "  the  time  is  declared  when  something  began  to  be.  But 
when  God  produced  this  remarkable  work  Moses  does  not  pre- 
cisely define."  "  Were  we  to  concede  to  naturalists,"  says 
Baumgarten  Crusius,  "  all  the  reasonings  which  they  advance 
in  favor  of  the  earth's  early  existence,  the  conclusion  would 
only  be,  that  the  earth  itself  has  existed  much  more  than  6000 
years,  and  that  it  had  then  already  suffered  many  great  and 
important  revolutions.  But  if  this  were  so,  would  the  rela- 
tion of  Moses  thereby  become  false  and  untenable  ?  I  cannot 
think  so."  "The  detailed  history  of  creation  in  the  first 


AND    GEN.    1  :    1,    2   NOT   IN    CONFLICT.  165 

chapter  of  Genesis,"  says  Dr.  Chalmers,  "  begins  at  the  mid- 
dle of  the  second  verse ;  and  what  precedes  might  be  under- 
stood as  an  introductory  sentence,  by  which  we  are  most 
appositely  told,  both  that  God  created  all  things  at  the  first, 
and  that  afterwards  —  by  what  interval  of  time  it  is  not 
specified  —  the  earth  lapsed  into  a  chaos,  from  the  darkness 
and  disorder  of  which  the  present  system  or  economy  of 
things  was  made  to  arise.  Between  the  initial  act  and  the 
details  of  Genesis,  the  world,  for  aught  we  know,  might  have 
been  the  theatre  of  many  revolutions,  the  traces  of  which 
geology  may  still  investigate,"  etc.  "  A  philological  survey 
of  the  initial  sections  of  the  Bible,"  says  Dr.  J.  Pye  Smith, 
"brings  out  the  result:  First, — That  the  prime  sentence  is 
a  simple,  independent,  all-comprehending  axiom,  to  this  effect 
—  that  matter,  elementary  or  combined,  aggregated  only  or 
organized,  and  dependent,  sentient,  and  intellectual  beings, 
have  not  existed  from  eternity,  either  in  self-continuity  or  in 
succession,  but  had  a  beginning ;  that  their  beginning  took 
place  by  the  all-powerful  will  of  one  Being,  the  Self-existent, 
Independent,  and  Infinite  in  all  perfection,  —  and  that  the  date 
of  that  beginning  is  not  made  known.  Second,  —  That  at  a 
recent  epoch,  our  planet  was  brought  into  a  state  of  disorgani- 
zation, detritus,  or  ruin,  (perhaps  we  have  no  perfectly  appro- 
priate term,)  from  a  former  condition.  Third,  —  That  it 
pleased  the  almighty,  wise,  and  benevolent  Supreme,  out  of 
that  state  of  ruin  to  adjust  the  surface  of  the  earth  to  its  now 
existing  condition,  —  the  whole  extending  through  the  period 
of  six  natural  days."  "  My  firm  persuasion  is,"  says  Dr. 
John  Harris,  "  that  the  first  verse  of  Genesis  was  designed 
by  the  Divine  Spirit,  to  announce  the  absolute  origination  of 
the  material  universe  by  the  Almighty  Creator ;  and  that  is  so 
understood  in  the  other  parts  of  holy  writ ;  —  that,  passing  by 
an  indefinite  interval,  the  second  verse  describes  the  state  of 
our  planet  immediately  prior  to  the  Adarnic  creation ;  and 
that  the  third  verse  begins  the  account  of  the  six  days'  work." 
8* 


166  THE   FORE-MENTIONED    FACTS 

"  Our  best  expositors  of  Scripture,"  says  Dr.  David  King,  of 
Glasgow,  "  seem  to  be  now  pretty  generally  agreed  that  the 
opening  verse  in  Genesis  has  no  necessary  connection  with 
the  verses  which  follow.  They  think  it  may  be  understood 
as  making  a  separate  and  independent  statement  regarding 
the  creation  proper,  and  that  the  phrase,  l  in  the  beginning,' 
may  be  expressive  of  an  indefinitely  remote  antiquity.  On 
this  principle  the  Bible  recognizes,  in  the  first  instance,  the 
great  age  of  the  earth,  and  then  tells  us  of  the  changes  it 
underwent,  at  a  period  long  subsequent,  in  order  to 
render  it  a  fit  abode  for  the  family  of  man.  The  work 
of  the  six  days  was  not,  according  to  this  view,  a  crea- 
tion in  the  strict  sense  of  the  term,  but  a  renovation,  a 
remodelling  of  preexistent  materials."  Citations,  young 
gentlemen,  could  be  greatly  multiplied  having  respect  to 
this  point,  —  but  a  labor  of  this  kind  must  be  deemed  now 
supererogatory.  Such  an  interpretation  of  nature  and  Scrip- 
ture as  is  set  forth  in  the  work  entitled,  "  Epoch  of  Creation" 
while  it  will  secure  the  preferences  of  some,  cannot,  we  are 
convinced,  at  this  late  day,  be  generally  entertained.  The 
motives  of  the  writer  are  indeed  to  be  respected,  it  having 
manifestly  been  his  desire  and  aim  to  subserve  the  cause  of 
science  and  religion.  If,  therefore,  his  effort  prove  a  failure 
—  which  we  have  no  doubt  it  must  —  while  such  failure  will 
not  itself  yield  him  positive  gratification,  it  will  at  least  not 
ignore  his  good  intentions,  nor  be  followed  by  qualms  of 
conscience. 

That  interpretation  of  the  initial  part  of  Genesis  of  which 
we  have  signified  our  approval,  but  which  we  were  not 
hasty  in  adopting,  can,  we  think,  alone  be  sustained  as  the 
correct  one.  Particularly  interested  it  is  believed  your 
minds  will  be  in  the  confirmation  which  it  receives  from  the 
facts  ascertained  or  settled  by  the  progress  of  geological  in- 
vestigation. Had  it  been  so  that  the  world's  prime  existence 
and  man's  had  been  contemporaneous,  then  we  should  expect 


AND    GEN.    1  :    1,    2   NOT    IN    CONFLICT.  167 

the  remains  of  human  kind  and  their  works  to  be  found  in- 
termingled with  the  remains  of  other  once  living  creatures  in 
the  different  fossiliferous  strata,  even  the  lowest ;  —  whereas, 
on  the  contrary,  no  human  remains,  as  you  have  heard,  have 
been  discovered  in  the  rocky  layers  composing  the  crust  of 
the  globe ;  nor  in  any,  says  Mr.  Richardson,  "  since  the  ac- 
cumulations of  silt  or  mud,  which  date  from  the  most  modern 
era,  the  yesterday,  as  it  were,  in  the  infinite  history  of  the 
past.  It  is  only  in  these  accumulations  of  the  historic  period 
that  we  discover  the  remains  of  even  the  most  ancient  fami- 
lies of  mankind.  In  the  solid  rocks,  we  repeat,  no  traces  of 
man  are  discernible ;  but  a  still  stronger  proof,"  continues  this 
writer,  "  of  the  modern  "  (he  means  comparatively  modern) 
"  date  of  our  species,  exists  in  the  obvious  fact,  that  if  man 
had  really  been  an  inhabitant  of  the  earth  during  the  earliest 
history,"  (meaning  during  the  earliest  period  of  the  earth's 
existence,)  "  his  skeleton,  or  the  mere  fragments  of  his  os- 
seous structure,  would  have  constituted  the  least  of  those  rel- 
ics which  he  would  have  bequeathed  to  the  soil  of  which  he 
was  an  inhabitant.  We  should  have  discovered  his  mighty 
and  majestic  works,  which  so  far  transcend  in  duration  his 
own  ephemeral  existence.  We  should  have  found  his  cities 
and  his  structures  overwhelmed  in  the  waters  of  ancient  seas, 
or  buried  beneath  the  ejections  of  primeval  volcanoes  ;  his 
majestic  pyramids  sunk  in  the  beds  of  ancient  rivers ;  his 
mountain  temples  hewn  on  the  surface  of  the  deepest  and 
the  oldest  rocks.  We  should  have  encountered  his  bridges 
of  granite  and  of  iron,  his  palaces  of  limestone  and  of  marble  ; 
the  tombs  wldlch  he  reared  over  the  objects  of  his  affection, 
the  shrines  which  he  erected  in  honor  of  his  God.  But  in 
the  absence  of  these  or  any  other  traces  of  man  in  any  save 
in  the  most  superficial  deposits,  we  are  compelled  to  acknowl- 
edge the  chronology  of  Holy  Writ ;  to  recognize  the  com- 
plete and  satisfactory  accordance  of  science  with  revelation  ; 
and  to  admit  that  the  existence  of  man  has  not  extended 
beyond  the  five  or  six  thousand  years  upon  the  earth,  which 


168  INQUIRY    AS    TO   PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE 

the  Scriptures  assign  as  the  period  of  his  creation."  (See 
Richardson's  Geology,  pp.  90,  91.) 

But,  let  us  suppose  you  to  say,  Is  it  not  marvellous  that 
such  an  event  as  Moses  describes  the  Noachian  Flood  to 
have  been,  should  leave  no  visible  evidences  behind  of  its 
occurrence ;  and  does  not  the  infidel  seem  to  be  thus  fur- 
nished with  a  pretty  powerful  weapon  with  which  to  contend 
against  the  truth  of  the  Mosaic  history  respecting  it  ?  —  In 
the  way  of  reply,  let  it  be  specially  noted,  that  we  do  not 
deny  that  there  are  any  visible  or  discoverable  traces  on  the 
earth's  surface,  or  beneath  it,  of  the  Noachian  deluge ;  but 
any  clearly  distinguishable  traces.  We  have  meant  to  say, 
and  to  produce  facts  to  show,  that  there  are  no  physical 
phenomena  or  appearances  beneath  or  even  upon  the  earth's 
surface,  concerning  which  it  can,  with  absolute  certainty,  be 
affirmed,  These  are  the  effects  of  the  Flood  of  Noah  ;  these 
are  determinate  proofs  of  its  occurrence. 

We  proceed  now  to  consider,  very  briefly,  how  this  absence 
of  distinguishable  traces  may  be  accounted  for.  First :  On 
the  supposition  that  the  theory  advanced  by  Hooke,  and 
subsequently  advocated  by  DeLuc,  Fairholme,  and  others, 
be  true,  so  far  as  relates  to  the  mutual  interchange  of  sea 
and  dry  land  at  the  time  of  the  Noachic  Flood,  i.  e.,  that  our 
postdiluvian  ocean  beds  were  mainly  antediluvian  dry  land, 
and  vice  versa,  —  an  idea  which  is  a  revived  favorite  with  at 
least  some  in  our  day,  (see  Friend  of  Moses,  &c.)  — then  are 
we  thereby  afforded  a  very  convincing  reason  why  our  present 
earth,  (dry  land,)  should  afford  no  visible,  distinguishable 
traces  of  the  Mosaic  inundation.  And  althou^fc  geologists  of 
no  mean  attainments  think  that  "  the  facts  of  geology  forbid 
the  idea  that  our  present  continents  formed  the  bed  of  the 
ocean  at  so  reeent  a  date  as  that  of  the  Noachic  cataclysm," 
vet — as  the  author  of  the  Friend  of  Moses  has  intimated  — 
the  bare  fact  of  the  so  remarkably  general  absence  of  human 
osseous  remains  and  human  works  of  art  from  the  present 


OF  THE  NOACHIC  DELUGE.  169 

habitable  parts  of  our  globe,  seems  very  strongly  to  favor 
that  idea.  If  the  antediluvians  and  their  works  were  buried 
beneath  the  present  oceans,  one  of  the  best  of  reasons  is  fur- 
nished why  the  remains  of  these  are  not  discernible  on  or  be- 
neath the  surface  of  our  present  continents  ;  and  will  go  far, 
to  say  the  least,  toward  accounting  for  the  absence  of  other 
diluvial  traces  from  our  postdiluvian  dry  land.  Or,  Secondly  : 
If  the  tranquil  theory,  advanced  and  advocated  by  Dr.  Flem- 
ing and  Sir  Charles  Lyell,  and  embraced  by  numerous  other 
savans,  be  received  as  true,  we  may  see  why  no  distinguisha- 
ble physical  traces  are  left  of  the  Mosaic  inundation.  Let  me 
give  you  a  few  sentences  from  the  writings  of  some  of  these 
men  regarding  this  point.  Dr.  Fleming,  who  we  believe  led 
the  way  in  advancing  the  tranquil  theory,  uses  the  following 
language :  "  I  have  formed  my  notions  of  the  Noachian  deluge, 
not  from  Ovid,  but  from  the  Bible.  There  the  simple  narra- 
tive of  Moses  permits  me  to  believe  that  the  waters  rose  upon 
the  earth  by  deyrees,  and  returned  by  degrees  ;  that  the  flood  ex- 
hibited no  violent  impetuosity,  neither  displacing  the  soil  nor 
the  vegetable  tribes  which  it  supported,  nor  rendering  the 
ground  unfit  for  the  cultivation  of  the  vine.  "With  this  con- 
viction in  my  mind,  I  am  not  prepared  to  witness  in  nature 
any  remaining  marks  of  the  catastrophe  ;  and  I  feel  my 
respect  for  the  authority  of  revelation  heightened  when  I 
see  on  the  present  surface  no  memorials  of  the  event." 
(See  Edinburgh  Phil.  Journal,  vol.  14,  pp.  214,  215.)  "I 
agree,"  says  Mr.  Lyell,  "  with  Dr.  Fleming,  that  in  the  nar- 
rative of  Moses  there  are  no  terms  employed  that  indicate 
the  impetuous  rushing  of  the  waters,  either  as  they  rose,  or 
when  they  retired  upon  the  restraining  of  the  rain  and  the 
passing  of  a  wind  over  the  earth.  On  the  contrary,  the  olive 
branch  brought  back  by  the  dove  seems  as  clear  an  indication 
to  us  that  the  vegetation  was  not  destroyed,  as  it  was  to  Noah 
that  the  dry  land  was  about  to  appear."  (Principles  of  Ge- 
ology, vol.  4,  p.  216.)  That  able  geological  writer,  Dr. 


170  INQUIRY   AS   TO    PHYSICAL    EVIDENCE 

Macculloch,  says,  "  There  is  nothing  in  this  history  (the  Mo- 
saic) from  which  we  can  infer  a  state  of  turbulence  or 
violence  in  the  water.  There  is  nothing  to  make  us  suppose 
that  the  deluge  could  have  disjoined  islands,  excavated 
valleys,  or  deposited  alluvia.  It  is  deficient  alike  in  the  two 
needful  powers,  motion  and  time.  In  this  plain  narrative, 
the  water  rises  during  a  short  period,  and  subsides  through 
one  not  long,  leaving  on  an  eminence  that  vessel  which  was 
to  preserve  and  perpetuate  man.  Of  the  Mosaic  deluge  in 
particular,  I  have  no  hesitation  in  saying,  that  it  has  never 
been  proved  to  have  produced  a  single  existing  appearance 
of  any  kind,  and  that  it  ought  to  be  struck  out  of  the  list 
of  geological  causes."  Yet  the  man  who  expressed  himself 
thus,  is  so  very  decided  in  his  views  of  the  supreme  authority 
of  the  Bible  over  all  science,  that  we  find  him  saying,  "  If 
there  were  aught  in  Geology  which  contradicted  that  Word, 
I  should  be  among  the  first  to  say,  the  science  is  in  error." 
(See  A  System  of  Geology  with  a  Theory  of  the  Earth,  and 
an  Examination  of  its  Connection  with  the  Sacred  Writings, 
by  John  Macculloch,  F.  R.  S.,  London,  1831,  vol.  2,  pp.  32, 
33.)  — "  It  has  been  justly  argued,"  says  the  Rev.  Dr.  Buck- 
land,  (Bridgewater  Treatise,  p.  95,)  "  that  as  the  rise  and  fall 
of  the  waters  of  the  Mosaic  deluge  are  described  to  have 
been  gradual,  and  of  short  duration,  they  would  have  pro- 
duced comparatively  little  change  on  the  surface  of  the  coun- 
try they  overflowed." 

Thirdly.  But  supposing  we  should  not  espouse,  in  its 
length  and  breadth,  "  the  tranquil  theory "  of  Dr.  Fleming 
and  Mr.  Lyell,  —  and  we  feel  a  little  inclined  to  agree  with 
Mr.  Harcourt  in  thinking  that  the  latter  of  these  gentlemen 
"  has  carried  his  theory  of  tranquillity  to  a  degree  which 
borders  upon  ridicule,"  when  he  lays  so  much  stress,  in  proof 
of  it,  on  the  circumstance  of  "  the  olive  leaf,"  which  the  dove 
brought  back,  as  remaining  through  the  cataclysm  ;  —  sup- 
posing we  should  admit  that  there  was  some  degree  of 


OF  THE  NOACHIC  DELUGE.  171 

violence  and  tumult  in  the  commencement,  continuance,  and 
retiring  of  the  diluvial  waters,  and  that  therefore  some  traces 
of  them  or  their  doings  must  have  been  left  behind,  —  yet 
will  any  man,  capable  of  estimating  the  effects  of  geological 
agencies,  maintain  that  these  traces,  being  superficial,  must 
have  certainly  remained  to  the  present  time  ? 

Dr.  Hitchcock,  (see  Bib.  Repository,  vol.  10,  p.  334), 
touching  this  point,  says  —  "Even  admitting  that  the  scriptu- 
ral account  would  lead  us  to  infer  that  not  a  little  of  violence 
and  tumultuous  action  attended  that  event  "  —  a  thing,  by  the 
way,  which  Dr.  Hitchcock,  when  he  penned  that  article, 
believed  —  "  it  does  not  follow  that  its  effects  could  be  distin- 
guished thousands  of  years  afterwards.  Currents  of  water 
could  have  affected  only  the  surface  of  the  globe,  and  their 
effects  would  be  similar  to  those  now  produced  by  rivers  and 
floods.  Yet  as  they  would  be  spread  over  the  whole  surface, 
and  not  so  much  confined  as  rivers  to  a  particular  channel, 
they  would  be  less  striking,  and  sooner  obliterated.  They 
would  consist  principally  in  the  removal  of  the  softer  parts  of 
the  surface,  and  the  abrasion  of  the  harder  parts.  But  simi- 
lar processes  have  been  going  on  ever  since  the  last  deluge, 
almost  everywhere ;  and  whether  after  the  lapse  of  centuries 
we  should  be  able  to  distinguish  diluvial  from  alluvial  action, 
it  is  impossible  to  say.  Perhaps  the  traces  of  Noah's  deluge 
might  be  all  obliterated.  If  they  are  all  gone,  then,  the  fact 
argues  nothing  against  the  scriptural  account."  —  Suppose, 
young  gentlemen,  that  in  our  opinion  there  are  many  and 
very  considerable  effects  remaining  at  this  day  on  the  earth, 
of  the  inundation  described  by  the  sacred  writer,  yet  the 
bare  fact  of  our  being  unable  to  identify  them  —  to  single 
them  out  from  effects  produced  by  other  instrumentalities, 
or  to  distinguish  them  from  more  modern  and  local  disturb- 
ances, and  present  them  as  certain  evidence,  —  this  inability, 
where  a  modicum  of  modesty  has  existence,  will  effectually 
prevent  a  resort  to  or  an  urging  of  such  appearances,  how- 


172  INQUIRY   AS   TO   PHYSICAL     EVIDENCE 

ever  plausible  or  probable,  in  proof  of  the  diluvial  occurrence 
which  we  are  considering.  There  is  one  thing  that  we  may 
affirm  with  confidence ;  —  it  is,  that  geology  presents  no 
facts  that  afford  any  presumption  against  the  occurrence  of 
that  stupendous  cataclysm  which  the  Scriptures  bring  to  our 
notice.  On  the  other  hand,  she  will  admit  that  "  in  the  ele- 
.  vation  and  subsidence  of  mountains  and  continents,  and  in 
volcanic  agency  generally,  of  which  geology  contains  so  many 
examples,  we  have  an  adequate  cause  for  extensive  if  not 
universal  deluges ;  nor  can  she  say  how  recently  this  cause 
may  have  operated  beneath  certain  oceans,  sufficiently  to 
have  produced  the  deluge  of  the  Scriptures.  So  that,  in  fact, 
we  have  in  geology  a  presumption  in  favor  of,  rather  than 
against  such  a  deluge." 

Having  such  testimony  as  that  of  the  Iraelitish  Moses,  — 
such  abundant  evidence  as  is  accessible  that  he  wrote  as  he 
was  moved  by  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  so  his  testimony  deci- 
sive —  in  favor  of  the  transpiring  of  the  diluvial  event  which 
he  has  narrated ;  and  in  addition  to  this,  the  remarkable 
kind  and  amount  of  mythological,  monumental,  traditional 
evidence,  corroborative,  if  it  be  proper  so  to  speak,  of  the 
Mosaic  history  in  relation  to  it  —  can  we  need  the  clear, 
indubitable  utterances  of  the  earth  itself  to  produce  complete 
conviction  in  our  minds,  that  what  the  archaic  annalist  has 
recorded  concerning  the  deluge  said  to  have  occurred  in  the 
days  of  Noah,  is  true  ?  Even  if  we  had  no  testimony  but 
that  of  Moses  to  the  fact ;  and  no  evidence  that  this  man  was 
anything  more  than  an  uninspired  but  credible  historian, 
would  we  act  irrationally  in  believing  firmly  that  such  a 
diluvial  event  occurred  as  he  relates  ?  Do  we  receive  as 
credible  no  professed  history  in  regard  to  any  matter,  unless 
we  have  other  evidence  than  that  of  the  testimony  of  the  his- 
torian in  its  support  ?  and,  we  may  add,  what  is  in  point, 
unless  we  can  find  inscribed  on  even  the  tablet  of  nature  un- 
questionable evidence  of  its  truth  ?  Are  we  not  prepared  to 


OF   THE   NOACHIC    DELUGE.  173 

say  that  the  man,  whoever  he  be,  acts  unbecomingly,  irra- 
tionally, who  refuses  to  believe  such  an  event  as  that  of  the 
Noachian  deluge,  so  called,  to  have  actually  occurred,  unless 
he  finds  other  evidence  to  sustain  it  than  that  which  he  has 
or  can  obtain  ? 


EVENING    THIRTEENTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN  : 

Something  relative  to  the  extent  of  the  Noachian  deluge 
you  will  not  be  unsolicitous  to  hear.  Was  it  universal,  or 
partial  ?  Better  satisfied  you  probably  will  or  may  reason- 
ably be,  to  have  a  brief  synopsis  of  the  arguments  on  both 
sides  of  this  question  laid  before  you,  rather  than  to  have  an 
expression  of  the  opinion  of  an  individual  so  humble  as  my- 
self. Suffer  me  first  to  state  the  chief  arguments  which  may 
be  adduced  in  favor  of  the  absolute  universality  of  the 
Noachic  cataclysm. 

First.  The  Sacred  Scriptures  seem  to  teach  this.  Let  a 
believer  in  Holy  Writ  come  without  prejudice  or  preposses- 
sion to  the  perusal  of  the  Mosaic  account  of  this  event,  and 
he  will  hardly  fail  of  arriving  at  the  conclusion  that  the 
Flood  of  Noah  extended  over  the  entire  globe.  Just  open 
your  Bible  and  read  Gen.  7  :  19-23.  What  limitation,  it 
might  with  emphasis  be  asked,  can  be  assigned  to  that  lan- 
guage in  the  first  of  those  verses  ?  —  "All  the  high  hills  that 
were  under  the  whole  heaven,  were  covered."  And  the  next 
verse,  "  Fifteen  cubits  upward  did  the  waters  prevail ;  and  the 
mountains  were  covered,"  appears  to  indicate  that  the  waters 
prevailed  so  many  cubits  above  all  the  mountains  of  the 
earth.  And  the  universal  destruction,  declared  in  the  three 
succeeding  verses,  of  all  sentient  and  animal  existence, 
save  alone  the  ark's  tenantry,  implies  the  absolutely  universal 


ON   THE    EXTENT    OP   NOAH*S    FLOOD.  175 

spread  of  the  destroying  element.  Let  it  be  added,  that 
the  covenant  spoken  of  in  Genesis  9  :  11,  with  the  language 
there  used,  appears  plainly  to  indicate  that  no  other  inunda- 
tion, up  to  the  end  of  time,  should  be  comparable  to  the  del- 
uge of  Noah.  Yet  many  partial  and  somewhat  destructive 
inundations  have  happened  since  the  time  of  that  cataclysm's 
occurrence,  and  many  more  doubtless  will.  It  seems  infer- 
able that  so  peculiarly  great  and  extensive  must  have  been 
the  Flood  of  Genesis,  as  to  be  wellnigh  or  quite  universal. 
"While  the  earth  remaineth,  seedtime  and  harvest,  etc., 
shall  not  cease  "  —  as  it  is  of  course  implied  they  had  done 
during  the  prevalence  of  more  than  the  twelvemonth  of  this 
desolating  judgment's  continuance. 

Secondly.  All  who  are  willing  to  rely  on  the  testimony  of 
Moses,  so  interpret  his  language  as  to  concede  that  all  man- 
kind, save  the  "  eight  souls  "  in  the  ark,  were  reached  and 
submerged  by  the  flood.  But  according  to  what  we  have 
(may  it  not  be  said,)  pretty  conclusively,  on  a  former  occa- 
sion, shown,  the  population  of  the  antediluvian  world  must 
have  been  very  numerous  and  wide-spread,  —  so  much  so, 
that  their  universal  submergence  must  have  required  so  ex- 
tensive a  flow  of  the  diluvial  waters  as  to  reach  wellnigh,  if 
not  entirely,  "  earth's  remotest  bounds."  I  know  that  Dr. 
Pye  Smith,  in  order  to  bring  the  population  of  the  Old  World 
within  such  numerical  limits  as  not  to  overstock  the  extreme- 
ly circumscribed  territory  marked  out  by  him  as  exclusively 
reached  by  the  Noachic  inundation,  has  computed  the  number 
to  which  mankind  attained  before  that  cataclysm,  as  exceed- 
ingly small,  —  so  small  that  he  will  find  few,  if  any,  to  accord 
with  him  in  opinion.  Any  theory  which  makes  the  antedilu- 
vian population  much  if  any  less  numerous  than  the  present 
population  of  the  globe,  will  probably  appear  to  you  unworthy 
to  be  entertained.  That  population  whom  the  flood  came 
and  took  away,  might  have  lived  within  narrower  geograph- 
ical limits  than  the  present,  —  we  are  disposed  to  imagine 


176  ON   THE    EXTENT    OF   NOAH'S    FLOOD. 

they  did  so,  —  yet  within  limits  by  no  means  so  circumscribed, 
that  the  before-named  eminent  author's  little  inundation 
could  have  reached  more  than  a  modicum  of  the  entire 
number. 

Thirdly.  If  the  deluge  of  the  Mosaic  history  were  local, 
limited,  instead  of  universal,  there  would  have  seemed  little 
necessity  for  such  a  direction  as  Noah  received  from  God,  to 
build  that  immense  structure,  the  ark ;  —  little  occasion  for 
incurring  such  an  expenditure  of  time  and  toil  as  was  en- 
countered in  its  construction.  That  enormous  vessel  could, 
we  would  think,  have  been  easily  dispensed  with.  The 
"  eight  souls  "  could  have  been  directed  by  the  Supreme  to 
repair  to  some  district  of  country  uninhabited  by  any  of  the 
wicked  progeny  of  Adam  whom  God  purposed  to  destroy  ;  a 
region  beyond  the  confines  of  the  territory  inhabited  by  the 
doomed  population,  and  which  the  Almighty  had  in  such  case 
determined  to  inundate  ;  —  and  all  the  living  creatures  which 
he  wished  to  preserve  could  have  been  caused  to  move  to 
that  exempt  locality  and  thus  find  escape  from  destruction 
by  the  diluvial  judgment.  Or,  if  the  specimens  of  the  various 
living  creatures  which  entered  the  ark  could  be  found  exist- 
ing in  the  locality  to  which  the  eight  souls  should  be  directed 
to  repair,  or  any  other  locality  indeed  which  the  waters  of 
the  local  inundation  should  not  reach,  —  then  the  change  of 
location  of  aught  beside  the  eight  souls  might  have  apparent- 
ly been  dispensed  with.  The  inference  which  may  be  le- 
gitimately drawn  is,  that  no  escape  by  such  means,  or  by 
other  than  the  ark,  was  feasible ;  and  so  that  the  deluge  of 
Noah  was  universal. 

Or  if,  to  preserve  all  beside,  an  ark  should,  even  in  case 
of  a  partial  inundation,  be  deemed  requisite ;  or,  for  the 
display  of  God's  holiness  and  justice,  if  both  a  deluge  and  an 
ark  should  be  regarded  as  essential,  —  why,  if  the  Flood  was 
but  local,  could  there  be  need  to  take  into  the  floating  vessel, 
birds,  and,  among  the  feathered  tribe,  so  widely  diffused 


ON   THE   EXTENT    OF   NOAH'S   FLOOD.  177 

ones,  as  the  dove  and  raven  ?  "  It  is,"  says  Kitto,  speaking 
on  this  point  —  "  it  is  altogether  a  most  remarkable  circum- 
stance, that  the  only  creatures,  of  those  contained  in  the  ark 
which  are  named,  are  those  whose  existence  upon  earth 
would  not  have  been  affected  by  any  deluge  much  less  than 
universal.  And  if  the  diluvial  waters  rose  fifteen  cubits 
above  all  the  mountains  of  the  countries  which  the  raven  and 
the  dove  inhabit,  the  level  must  have  been  high  enough  to 
give  universality  to  the  deluge." 

You  recollect  we  referred  you,  a  few  evenings  since,  to 
the  traditions  existing  among  all  nations  relative  to  the 
Noachic  Flood.  From  the  universality  of  those  traditions 
an  argument  has  sometimes  been  deduced,  to  support  the 
doctrine  of  the  universality  of  the  historic  or  Mosaic  deluge. 
The  argument  is  not  conclusive.  Nothing  indeed  is  proved 
by  it  on  either  side.  The  existence  of  such  traditions  in 
different  nations  does  not  prove  that  the  deluge  to  which  they 
refer  prevailed  in  all  those  several  nations.  The  people  of 
those  several  nations  springing  all  from  a  common  ancestry, 
and  that  ancestry  those  whom  the  ark  had  been  the  instru- 
ment in  saving  from  the  flood,  —  this  circumstance  is  suffi- 
cient to  account  for  the  so  wide  prevalence  of  the  traditions 
spoken  of.  It  was  natural  that  every  nation  indeed  should 
in  its  tradition  make  its  own  land  the  scene  of  the  calamity 
to  which  such  tradition  had  reference,  —  to  localize  the 
event,  and  in  their  own  territory.  This  at  least  to  a  great 
extent  was  done.  Though  such  a  use  as  that  we  have 
alluded  to,  may  not,  —  yet  no  less  than  two  other  important 
uses  may,  be  made  of  those  traditions  of  all  people.  One  of 
these  has  been  formerly  availed  of,  viz. :  to  confirm  the 
Mosaic  account  of  the  Flood;  to  show,  as  the  Sacred 
Scriptures  affirm,  that  there  was  an  inundation  by  which  the 
whole  family  of  man,  Noah  and  his  household  excepted, 
were  destroyed.  The  other  use  —  and  it  is  one  which 
speculating  infidelity  will  not  like  —  is,  to  serve  as  an 


178  ON    THE    EXTENT    OF   NOAH'S  JFLOOD. 

auxiliary  in  proving,  in  further  conformity  with  the 
Scripture  record,  that  all  the  existing  nations  and  tribes  of 
men  are  descended  from  that  one  little  family  which  survived 
the  Deluge. 

Nor  is  that  old  argument  of  any  appositeness  or  validity 
toward  proving  the  universality  of  the  Flood,  which  Stack- 
house,  in  his  Bible  History,  has  stated  thus  :  "  We  need  only 
turn  aside  the  surface  a  little,  and  look  into  the  bowels  of  the 
earth,  and  we  shall  find  arguments  enough  for  our  convic- 
tion," i.  e.  that  the  Flood  was  universal.  "  For  the  beds  of 
shells,  which  are  often  found  on  the  tops  of  the  highest 
mountains,  and  the  petrified  bones,  and  teeth  of  fishes,  which 
are  dug  up  some  hundreds  of  miles  from  the  sea,  are  the 
clearest  evidences  in  the  world,  that  the  waters  have  some 
time  or  other,  overflowed  the  highest  parts  of  the  earth ; 
nor  can  it,  with  any  color  of  reason,  be  asserted  that  these 
subterraneous  bodies  are  only  the  mimicry  or  mock  produc- 
tions of  nature ;  for,  that  they  are  real  shells  the  nicest  ex- 
amination, both  of  the  eye  and  microscope,  does  evince  ;  and 
that  they  are  true  bones,  may  be  proved  by  burning  them, 
which,  as  it  does  other  bones,  turns  them  first  into  a  coal,  and 
afterwards  into  calx."  We  have  before  offered  reasons  why 
the  fossil  remains,  marine  and  other,  found  in  the  rocky  strata 
of  six  or  seven  miles  in  thickness,  as  well  as  those  found  in 
the  detritus  nearer  the  surface,  cannot  rightly  be  regarded  as 
vestiges  or  effects  of  the  Noachian  deluge.  If  this  be  so, 
they  cannot  of  course  be  adduced  as  evidence  of  the  uni- 
versality of  that  deluge.  It  may  here,  en  passant,  be  re- 
marked, that  all  the  strata  encrusting  the  globe,  to  the  depth 
of  from  seven  to  ten  miles,  unquestionably  show  the  action 
of  water  in  their  formation,  and  that  the  vast  deposits  of 
marine  organic  remains  in  a  large  portion  of  those  strata 
everywhere  found,  and  under  the  circumstances  in  which 
they  are  found  existing,  show  that  the  ocean  not  merely  once, 
but  several  times,  occupied  the  parts  of  the  earth  now  consti- 


ON   THE   EXTENT    OP   NOAH's   FLOOD.  179 

luting  the  continents  of  our  planet.  As  to  the  point  before  us, 
we  need  only  urge — what  is  fatal  to  the  argument  quoted  from 
Stackhouse, — the  fact  that  neither  the  works  nor  the  osseous  re- 
mains of  man  have  been  found  any  deeper  than  in  the  upper 
part  of  that  superficial  deposit  called  alluvium.  Had  the 
miles  of  rocky  strata — miles  in  density  —  which  we  have 
spoken  of,  been  formed,  and  the  fossil  organic  remains,  to  the 
depth  we  have  mentioned,  been  deposited,  by  or  at  the  time 
of  the  Flood  of  the  Mosaic  history,  or  even  since  man's  cre- 
ation, no  plausible  or  possible  reason,  it  seems  to  us,  can  be 
assigned  why  his  bones  and  the  fruits  of  his  labors  should  not 
be  found  intermixed  with  those  of  other  animals  in  the  rocky 
strata  referred  to,  as  well  as  in  the  mass  of  detritus  above 
the  latter,  and  underlying  the  superficial  alluvium  where 
alone  human  osseous  and  mechanical  or  industrial  remains 
are  discoverable. 

Fourthly.  But,  in  the  way  of  argument  for  a  universal 
deluge,  may  not  the  following  be  urged  ?  It  has  been  the 
opinion  of  several  geologists  that  back  beyond  the  six  geogonic 
days,  our  continents  have  been  several  times  the  beds  of 
seas,  and  have  continued  so  for  a  long  period  each  time,  and 
that  these  continents  did  not  rise  into  dry  land  by  the  exceed- 
ingly slow  process  of  sedimentary  deposition,  but  by  means 
of  earthquakes,  subterraneous  fires,  valcanic  agency.  Now  if 
there  were  such  general  submergences  of  our  dry  land  far 
back,  may  there  not,  reasoning  from  analogy,  have  been  a 
general  submergence  of  the  dry  land  at  the  time  of  the 
Mosaic  Flood  ?  Does  not  even  the  archaic  annalist  himself, 
in  Gen.  1 :  9,  10,  taken  in  connection  with  the  second  verse, 
use  language  of  such  sort  as  to  imply  that  there  was  some- 
thing equivalent  to  a  universal  deluge  prevailing  on  this  planet 
when  the  work  of  the  six  geogonic  days  commenced  ?  Does 
it  not  seem  as  though  there  was  no  dry  land  visible,  until  on 
the  third  day  God  made  it  to  appear  ?  If  there  then  had 
been  a  general  submergence  of  the  dry  land  just  prior  to  the 


180  ON    THE    EXTENT   OF    NOAH'S   FLOOD. 

creation  of  Adam,  may  not  a  submergence  have  taken  place 
in  the  time  of  his  descendant,  Noah,  bearing  such  a  resem- 
blance to  it  as  to  call  for  a  "  gathering  together  of  the  waters 
into  one  place,"  as  it  were,  and  a  thus  "  making  the  dry  land 
to  appear  ?  " 

Lastly,  —  on  this  side:  Could  the  diluvial  waters  have 
extended  so  far  and  wide  as  to  drown  all  the  antediluvian 
inhabitants,  and  have  attained  such  an  elevation  as  fifteen 
cubits  above  the  loftiest  mountains  of  the  globe,  and  yet  not 
be  borne  by  the  law  of  gravity  over  the  earth's  entire  sur- 
face ?  Without  supernatural  interposition  could  any  portion 
of  it  have  escaped  being  inundated? 

We  shall  now  take  a  glance  at  the  other  side  of  this  ques- 
tion ;  —  shall  proceed  to  state  briefly  the  main  arguments  in 
favor  of  the  local,  limited  character  of  Noah's  Flood.  These 
arguments  will  be  presented  mainly  in  the  form  of  objections 
to  the  tenet  that  the  cataclysm  of  sacred  history  was  univer- 
sal. Connected  with  the  statement  of  the  objective  arguments, 
it  may  be  expedient  to  hint  at  the  manner  in  which  they  have 
been  or  may  be  met  by  those  who  hold  to  the  flood's  universal 
extent.  This  is  deemed  proper,  because  the  literal  interpre- 
tation of  the  language  of  Moses  appears  to  call  for  an  un- 
limited inundation. 

To  clear  the  way  for  the  presentation  of  the  arguments  on 
the  limited  side,  without,  in  doing  so,  appearing  unwilling 
to  receive  most  readily  and  cordially  as  true  what  the  inspired 
pages  bear  witness  to  on  this  subject,  we  will  show  how  those 
who  espouse  the  limited  side  meet  the  charge  of  running 
counter  to  Holy  Writ  in  the  entertainment  of  their  view. 
Admitting  with  candor  that  the  language  employed  by  the 
archaic  historian  to  describe  the  deluge  does  seem  to  denote  a 
literal  universality  —  especially  that  used  in  the  nineteenth 
verse  of  the  seventh  chapter  —  "  the  waters  prevailed  exceed- 
ingly upon  the  earth ;  and  all  the  high  hills  that  were  under 
the  whole  heaven  were  covered"  —  they  urge  in  answer,  that 


ON    THE    EXTENT    OF   NOAIl's    FLOOD.  181 

in  the  sacred  writings,  "  universal  terms  are  often  used  to 
signify  only  a  very  large  amount  in  number  or  quantity."  (See 
Dr.  Pye  Smith's  Scripture  and  Geology,  p.  247.)  They  call 
on  us  to  note  such  passages  as  the  following :  —  "And  tjhe 
famine  was  over  all  the  face  of  the  earth ;  and  all  the  coun- 
tries came  to  Egypt,  to  buy  corn  from  Joseph,  because  that 
the  famine  was  extreme  in  all  the  lands,"  (Gen.  41 :  56,  57.) 
Yet  it  is  manifest  that  only  those  countries  are  meant  lying 
around  or  within  practicable  distance  of  Egypt,  for  so  bulky 
an  article  as  corn  or  grain,  was  transported,  it  is  highly  proba- 
ble, on  the  backs  of  asses  and  camels.  "All  the  cattle  of  Egypt 
died,"  (Ex.  9  :  G ;)  yet  the  connection  shows  that  this  ex- 
pression is  to  be  taken  in  a  limited  sense.  "  The  hail  smote 
every  herb  of  the  field,  and  brake  every  tree  of  the  field,"  — 
but,  a  few  days  subsequently,  the  devastation  of  the  locust  is 
described  thus  :  "  Jhey  did  eat  every  herb  of  the  land,  and 
all  the  fruit  of  the  trees,  which  the  hail  had  left,"  (Ibid  10 : 
5,  15.)  "  All  the  people  brake  off  the  golden  ear-rings  which 
were  in  their  ears,  and  brought  them  unto  Aaron,"  (Ibid  32  : 
3,)  — meaning,  undoubtedly,  a  large  number  of  persons,  but 
far  from  literally  the  whole,  or  even  a  majority  of  the  people, 
as  will  appear  upon  an  examination  of  the  whole  account. 
"  This  day  will  I  begin  to  put  the  dread  of  thee,  and  the  fear 
of  thee,  upon  the  nations  that  are  under  the  whole  heaven," 
(Deut.  2 :  25 ;)  yet  this  declaration  seems  to  respect  only  the 
nations  of  Canaan  and  those  lying  upon  its  frontier.  "And 
all  the  earth  sought  to  Solomon  to  hear  his  wisdom,"  (1  Kings 
10 :  24.)  It  need  not  be  said  that  this  language  is  used  in  a 
limited  sense.  Passages  are  numerous  in  which  the  phrase 
"  all  the  earth "  signifies  only  the  land  of  Palestine.  "We 
would  instance,  Deut,  34  :  1 ;  Isai.  7  :  24  ;  10 :  14  ;  Jer.  1  : 
18;  4:  20;  8:  16;  12:  12;  40:  4;  Zeph.  1:  18;  3:  19; 
Zech.  14:10.  In  Acts  2 :  5,  it  is  said  that  at  the  time  of 
Pentecost,  "  there  were  dwelling  at  Jerusalem  Jews,  devout 
men,  out  of  every  nation  under  heaven."  Yet  in  the  enumera- 
9 


182  ON    THE    EXTENT    OF   NOAH'S    FLOOD. 

tion,  which  follows  this  passage,  of  the  different  places  from 
which  those  Jews  had  come,  we  find  only  a  region  extending 
from  Italy  to  Persia,  and  from  Egypt  to  the  Euxine.  It 
could  have  been  a  district  of  only  about  similar  size  which 
Paul  meant,  when,  addressing  the  Colossians,  (1  :  23,)  he 
speaks  of  the  gospel  as  that  "  which  was  preached  to  every 
creature  which  is  under  heaven."  The  phraseology  of  these 
passages  is  so  similar  to  that  descriptive  of  the  deluge ;  so 
universal  are  the  terms  while  we  cannot  doubt  their  import 
to  be  limited  —  that  we  are  abundantly  justified,  they  think? 
in  considering  the  deluge  as  limited  —  if  other  parts  of  the 
Bible,  or  the  facts  of  natural  history,  require  such  a  limita- 
tion— which  they  believe  to  be  the  case.  On  the  ground  of 
such  analogy  as  we  have  been  speaking  of  in  the  use  of  uni- 
versal terms,  eminent  biblical  expositors,  anterior  to  geology's 
existence,  as  a  science,  as  well  as  since,  ha,ve  so  interpreted 
the  Mosaic  account  of  the  deluge,  as  to  understand  that  inun- 
dation to  have  been  limited.  They  so  understood  it  on  exe- 
getical  grounds.  It  appears,  too,  from  some  remarks  which 
they  have  dropped,  that  they  were  the  better  satisfied  with 
their  interpretation  on  the  ground  that  there  appeared  to  them 
no  necessity  for  a  universal  deluge,  as  the  same  end,  they 
thought,  might  be  accomplished  by  a  partial  one.  Let  us  hear 
what  is  said  by  two  or  three  of  the  interpreters  referred  to. 

Said  Bishop  Stillingfleet  (Origines  Sacrse,  Book  3,  chap- 
ter 4,)  "  I  cannot  see  any  urgent  necessity  from  the  Scripture 
to  assert  that  the  flood  did  spread  over  all  the  surface  of  the 
earth.  That  all  mankind,  those  in  the  ark  excepted,  were 
destroyed  by  it,  is  most  certain,  according  to  the  Scriptures. 
The  flood  was  universal  as  to  mankind ;  but  from  thence  fol- 
lows no  necessity  at  all  of  asserting  the  universality  of  it  as 
to  the  globe  of  the  earth,  unless  it  be  sufficiently  proved  that 
the  whole  earth  was  peopled  before  the  flood,  which  I  despair 
of  ever  seeing  proved."  "  Consentiunt  quidem  omnes,"  says 
DeLuc,  "  diluvium  universale  fuisse,  quotenus  totum  orbem, 


ON   THE    EXTENT    OF   NOAH'S   FLOOD.  183 

habitatum  oppressit,  universumque  humanum  genus  ex- 
empla  Noachi  familia,  eo  interiit.  At  alii  volunt  totum 
telluris  globum  aquis  tectum  fuisse,  quod  alii  negant."  That 
eminent  divine,  Matthew  Poole,  in  his  Synopsis,  on  Gen.  7  : 
19,  remarks  as  follows :  "It  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  the 
entire  globe  of  the  earth  was  covered  with  water.  Where 
was  the  need  of  overwhelming  those  regions  in  which  there 
were  no  human  beings  ?  It  would  be  highly  unreasonable  to 
suppose  that  mankind  had  so  increased  before  the  deluge,  as 
to  have  penetrated  to  all  the  corners  of  the  earth.  Absurd 
it  would  be  to  affirm  that  the  effects  of  the  punishment  in- 
flicted upon  men  alone,  applied  to  places  in  which  there  were 
no  men.  If  then  we  should  entertain  the  belief  that  not  so 
much  as  the  hundredth  part  of  the  globe  was  overspread  with 
water,  still  the  deluge  would  be  universal,  because  the  extir- 
pation took  effect  upon  all  the  part  of  the  world  which  was 
inhabited."  In  another  work,  his  Annotations,  published 
after  his  death,  the  same  author  says,  "  Peradventure  this 
flood  might  not  be  simply  universal  over  the  whole  earth,  but 
only  over  the  habitable  world,  where  either  men  or  beasts 
lived ;  which  was  as  much  as  either  the  meritorious  cause  of 
the  flood,  the  sins  of  men,  or  the  end  of  it,  the  destruction  of 
all  men  and  beasts,  required."  Dr.  J.  Pye  Smith,  after  refer- 
ring to  scriptural  instances  in  which  universal  terms  were  to 
be  understood  in  a  limited  sense,  says  :  "  From  these  in- 
stances of  the  scriptural  idiom  in  the  application  of  phrase- 
ology similar  to  that  in  the  narrative  concerning  the  Flood,  I 
humbly  think  that  those  terms  do  not  oblige  us  to  understand 
a  literal  universality ;  so  that  we  are  exonerated  from  some 
otherwise  insuperable  difficulties  in  Natural  History  and  Ge- 
ology. If  so  much  of  the  earth  was  overflowed  as  was  occu- 
pied by  the  human  race,  both  the  physical  and  the  moral  ends 
of  that  awful  visitation  were  answered."  The  Rev.  David 
King,  LL.  D.,  of  Glasgow,  in  his  recent  work,  entitled, 
"  Principles  of  Geology  explained,"  says :  "  Our  best  expos- 


184  ON    THE    EXTENT    OF   NOAH'S    FLOOD. 

itors  of  Scripture  are  now  generally  of  opinion  that  the 
flood,  though  extensive,  was  local,"  p.  56.  "If  we  adopt," 
he  adds,  (p.  61,)  "  the  principle  which  the  Scripture  itself  so 
unequivocally  sanctions  —  that  general  terms  may  be  used 
with  a  limited  sense  —  the  whole  account  is  simple  and  con- 
sistent. A  deluge  of  great  extent  inundated  the  dry  land. 
In  respect  to  men,  whom  it  was  designed  to  punish  for  their 
wickedness,  it  was  universal,  excepting  only  Noah  and  his 
family,  whom  it  pleased  God  to  spare  alive.  Along  with 
them  were  preserved  such  animals  as  were  most  useful  to 
them,  and  such  as  were  fitted  to  fulfil  the  purposes  of  Provi- 
dence after  the  waters  should  have  retired." 

The  dijficulties'which  beset  the  idea  of  a  literally  universal 
deluge,  irrespective  of  those  which  geology  presents,  are 
indeed  somewhat  formidable.  Some  of  these  allow  me  now 
to  state.  You  will  find  a  more  full  and  formidable  array  of 
them  in  the  works  of  Dr.  J.  P.  Smith  and  President  Hitchcock. 

The  first  difficulty  which  we  will  mention  arises  from  the 
enormous  amount  of  water  which,  it  has  been  urged,  would  be 
requisite  to  effect  an  absolutely  universal  inundation.  It 
has  been  said,  for  instance,  that  to  cover  the  earth  to  the  tops 
of  the  highest  mountains,  the  quantity  of  water  requisite 
would  be  eight  times  greater  than  that  existing  on  the 
present  surface  of  the  globe.  In  some  of  the  theories  of 
which  we  on  a  former  occasion  made  mention,  you  may  have 
noticed  an  attempt  to  meet  this  difficulty.  If  there  be  —  or 
prior  to  the  deluge  were  — underlying  the  earth's  crust,  such 
a  massive  aqueous  abyss  as  the  projectors  of  those  theories 
speak  of;  or  a  large  number  of  minor  abysses,  communicating 
with  the  superficial  seas,  as  others  have  conjectured,  or,  I 
might  say,  as  they  have  considered  Moses  as  teaching  when 
he  speaks  of  "  the  fountains  of  the  great  deep,"  —  then  would 
there  be  found  no  inadequate  supply  of  liquid  stores  probably, 
when  brought  up  to  the  earth's  surface  —  and  their  theories, 


ON  THE  EXTENT  OF  NOAH'S  FLOOD.        185 

you  remember,  suggest  one  or  another  mode  of  accomplishing 
that  —  to  inundate  this  entire  little  planet,  and  to  the  degree 
which  the  Scriptures  seem  to  indicate.  This  idea  of  the  ex- 
istence of  one  vast  abyss,  or  many  inferior  abysses,  in  the 
earth's  bowels,  is,  in  the  view  of  those  who  entertain  it,  sug- 
gested, or  at  least  supported,  by  Scripture ;  not  merely  by  the 
expression  "  fountains  of  the  great  deep,"  used  by  Moses,  but 
by  several  passages  besides,  such  as  the  following  cited  by 
Stackhouse :  — "  God  founded  the  earth  upon  the  seas,  and 
established  it  upon  the  floods  "  — "  He  stretched  out  the  earth 
above  the  waters  ;  he  gathered  up  the  waters  as  in  a  bag  "  — 
so  some  translate  it,  "  and  laid  up  the  depth  in  storehouses." 
"  When  he  set  a  compass  upon  the  face  of  the  depth ;  when 
he  strengthened  the  fountains  of  the  deep."  But  that  these 
passages  teach  the  existence  of  a  vast  subterranean  abyss,  a 
large  number  of  miles  in  depth,  encircling  the  whole  interior 
of  the  globe  ;  or  a  large  number  of  great  but  minor  subterra- 
neous abysses,  is  not  very  generally  understood,  we  think,  by 
biblical  expounders.  Certain  it  is,  that  since  the  recent  re- 
markable discoveries  made  concerning  central  heat,  the  idea 
is  not,  it  is  believed,  among  able  Christian  geologists,  com- 
monly entertained.  "  The  internal  parts  of  the  earth  "  —  we 
quote  from  Dr.  Hitchcock's  Religion  of  Geology,  p.  21 
—  "  are  found  to  possess  a  very  high  temperature ;  nor  can 
it  be  doubted  that  at  least  oceans  of  melted  matter  exist 
beneath  the  crust ;  and  perhaps  even  all  the  deep-seated  in- 
terior is  in  a  state  of  fusion."  The  idea  of  an  abyss  or 
abysses  of  water  of  great  depth  in  themselves,  and  deeply 
seated  in  the  earth,  is  hardly  consistent  with  such  a  fact,  if 
fact  it  be.  Enough  is  now  known  of  the  structure  of  this 
earth  to  convince  us  that  no  subterranean  aqueous  stores  exist 
in  the  earth's  interior,  equal  to  an  emergency  such  as  that  of 
inundating  the  entire  surface  of  the  globe  to  a  depth  of 
five  miles  above  the  seas'  present  level.  The  expression 


186  ON   THE   EXTENT    OP   NOAIl's    FLOOD. 

"  the  great  deep,"  or  "  fountains  of  the  great  deep,"  is  so 
used  elsewhere  in  the  Scriptures,  as  to  show  it  to  denote  the 
general  collection  of  oceanic  waters,  or  the  seas,  regarded 
and  spoken  of  as  deep  places,  occupying  different  portions  of 
the  surface  of  the  earth. 


EVENING  FOURTEENTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

Having  at  the  close  of  the  last  evening's  Exercise  consid- 
ered one  of  the  difficulties  besetting  the  idea  of  a  literally 
universal  deluge,  let  us  now  proceed  to  notice  others.  We 
will  begin  with  the  following :  —  If  such  a  mass  of  waters 
were  actually  brought  upon  the  earth  as  would  be  sufficient 
to  overlie  all  the  plains  not  only,  but  hills  and  mountains  of 
the  entire  globe,  and  rise  to  the  height  above  them  all  of  fif- 
teen cubits,  the  consequences  which  would  ensue,  in  the  view 
of  Dr.  J.  Pye  Smith,  would  be,  he  knows  not  how  awfully 
disastrous.  There  would  be,  he  says, "  an  increase  of  the 
equatorial  diameter  by  some  eleven  or  twelve  miles.  Two 
new  elements  would  hence  accrue  to  the  actions  of  gravity 
upon  our  planet.  The  absolute  weight  would  be  greatly  in- 
creased, and  the  causes  of  the  mutation  of  the  axis  would  be 
varied.  I  am  not  competent,"  he  continues, "  to  the  calculation 
of  the  changes  in  the  motions  of  the  earth  whieh  would  thus  be 
produced,  and  which  would  propagate  their  effects  through  the 
whole  solar  system  ;  and  indeed  to  the  entire  extent  of  the 
material  creation:  but  they  would  certainly  be  very  great.'* 
To  this  it  might  be  remarked,  that  if,  to  effect  the  universal 
Flood,  there  were  no  actual  increase  or  addition  to  the  quan- 
tity of  the  water,  but  only  a  bringing  of  the  previously  ex- 
isting masses  from  their  repositories  in  oceans,  seas,  lakes, 


188  ON   THE   EXTENT   OF   NOAH'S   FLOOD. 

by  the  expansive  power  of  underlying  fires,  or  by  some  sub- 
terranean or  other  forces,  over  the  surface  of  the  antecedently 
dry  land,  no  augmentation  would  there  then  be  of  this  planet's 
gravity,  and  no  such  disastrous  effects  would  ensue  to  the  en- 
tire universe,  or  to  the  different  portions  of  the  solar  system, 
as  the  just  named  eminent  author  apprehended.  At  least  "I 
am  not  competent "  to  conceive  that  there  would  any  such 
alarming  consequences  follow.  But  this,  it  might  be  said, 
would  be  only  bringing  forward  one  difficulty  to  prevent 
another.  For  to  this  idea  of  the  sea  and  land  changing 
places  at  the  time  of  the  deluge,  there  are  objections.  Besides 
some  which  may  be  conceived,  of  a  more  strictly  geological 
character,  there  are  two  quite  obvious  ones  which  may  be 
urged:  One  in  reference  to  the  Garden  of  Eden ;  and  the 
other,  the  olive  leaf.  First,  in  relation  to  the  Garden  of  Eden. 
The  interchange  of  sea  and  dry  land  at  the  time  of  the  flood, 
it  may  be  and  has  been  urged,  involves  the  permanent  sub- 
mergence of  the  ancient  paradise ;  implies  that  that  once 
favored  spot,  "  the  Garden,"  now,  according  to  that  hypothesis, 
forms  a  part  of  the  present  ocean's  bed  ;  but  Moses,  in  his 
description,  which  he  wrote  some  centuries  subsequent  to  the 
deluge,  evidently  did  not  so  understand  or  represent  it.  He 
obviously  meant  his  readers  to  understand,  that  Eden's  local- 
ity might,  in  his  day  at  least,  be  ascertained  without  any  great 
difficulty. 

The  author  of  that  singularly  entitled  work,  The  Friend  of 
Moses,  has  devised,  or  at  least  stated,  a  plan  to  meet  it.  It  is, 
if  we  mistake  not,  by  supposing  the  region  to  which  the  Gar- 
den of  Eden  belonged,  to  have  been  exempted  in  one  respect 
from  the  fate  of  all  the  other  antediluvian  territory.  He 
supposes  that  region  to  have,  after  a  brief  season,  emerged 
from  the  waters,  and  have  constituted  ever  since  a  part  of  the 
dry  land  of  our  postdiluvian  world.  (See  that  work,  p.  349.) 

As  to  the  "olive  leaf"  of  which  Moses  speaks  —  not  olive 
branch,  as  Mr.  Lyell  calls  it  —  and  the  rapid  appearance 


ON  THE  EXTENT  OF  NOAH'S  FLOOD.        189 

indeed  of  vegetation  in  general  after  the  deluge  —  these  Mr. 
Fairholme  and  Dr.  Hamilton  attempt  to  account  for  in  con- 
sistency with  the  idea  of  an  interchange  of  sea  and  dry  land 
at  the  flood.  The  former,  in  answer  to  the  question,  "  Whence 
then  came  the  olive  leaf?"  responds,  "Whence,  we  may  ask 
in  return,  came  the  vegetation  on  which  the  first  created 
animals  fed  ?  and  how  was  the  face  of  the  earth  renewed  and 
rearranged  in  the  beautiful  order  in  which  we  now  see  it  ? 
Although  no  mention  is  made,  by  the  sacred  historian,  of  the 
exercise  of  creative  power  after  the  deluge,  yet  we  are  left  to 
infer  the  unavoidable  necessity  of  such  rearrangement,  unless 
we  are  prepared  to  reject  both  the  record  of  the  flood  itself, 
and  the  clear  corroborations  of  that  record  which  can  be 
drawn  from  the  geological  phenomena  of  the  earth."  (See 
Fairholme's  Geol.  of  Scripture,  p.  349.)  The  latter,  Dr. 
Hamilton,  does  not  think  it  needful  to  insist  on  the  exercise 
of  creative  power  in  order  to  the  renewal  of  vegetation  on  the 
earth's  surface  after  the  deluge,  and  so  the  appearance  of  the 
olive  leaf.  "  It  is  quite  natural  to  suppose,"  says  he,  "  that, 
as  the  ancient  lands  sank  beneath  the  waters,  immense  quan- 
tities of  fertile  soil  would  be  washed  away  by  those  waters, 
and  would  be  held  in  solution  therein ;  and  also  that  seeds  in 
great  variety  and  in  vast  quantities,  and  fruits  of  all  sorts, 
would  be  lifted  up,  and  would  remain  floating  about ;  and  that 
as  the  new  lands  were  rising,  great  quantities  of  this  soil 
would  be  deposited  thereon,  in  the  form  of  mud  ;  and  seeds 
of  all  sorts,  still  capable  of  germinating,  would  be  lodged  in 
various  localities  on  the  emerging  lands,  many  of  them  mixed 
with  and  covered  up  in  the  mud  so  deposited,  and  which,  after 
a  very  short  time  of  favorable  weather,  in  that  genial  climate, 
would  present,  in  suitable  situations,  thousands  of  patches  of 
thriving  vegetation  ;  much  as  now,  every  year,  is  observed 
in  Egypt,  on  the  retiring  of  the  waters  of  the  Nile.  Among 
these  patches  of  verdure,  the  rapidly  shooting  scions  of  seed- 
ling trees,  and  vines  and  shrubs,  in  countless. variety  might 


190  ON   THE    EXTENT    OF   NOAH'S    FLOOD. 

appear.  As  to  the  olive  leaf,  this  writer  says,  "  The  leaf  of 
a  seedling  olive  plant,  some  few  days  old,  would  have  answered 
every  purpose  to  indicate  the  ground  left  dry  by  the  retiring 
waters,  and  the  commencing  of  vegetation." 

The  aqueous  treasures  of  the  antediluvian  ocean,  if  trans- 
ferred to,  would  be  all-sufficient  to  cover  the  depressed  ante- 
diluvian dry  land  entirely,  and  rise  to  that  altitude,  even, 
above  the  most  elevated  parts  (fifteen  cubits,)  which  the 
sacred  writer  indicates  ;  and  this,  without  adopting  the  suppo- 
sition of  Steno,  as  quoted  by  Lyell,  that  the  loftiest  moun- 
tains of  the  antediluvian  dry  land  may  not  have  been  very 
high. 

Mr.  Gleig  takes  it  for  granted  that  the  time  has  gone  by 
when  any  one  pretending  to  the  character  of  a  philosopher 
or  man  of  science,  would  dream  of  objecting  to  the  Mosaic 
account  of  the  deluge  —  which  he  thinks  most  obviously 
teaches  the  absolute  universality  of  that  catastrophe  or 
judgment  —  on  the  ground  of  a  difficulty  in  finding  a  suffi- 
ciency of  water  for  the  purpose,  —  inasmuch,  especially,  as 
philosophers,  from  obvious  phenomena,  have  inferred  that 
the  globe  has,  anterior  to  the  Noachic  flood,  been  several 
times  covered  and  for  a  long  season  with  water.  This 
author  throws  out  the  intimation,  indeed,  that,  according  to 
the  theory  on  a  former  occasion  mentioned,  "  it  is  not  neces- 
sary to  suppose  that  the  waters  prevailed  over  the  whole 
surface  of  the  earth  at  one  and  the  same  time.  If  the  foun- 
tains of  the  great  deep,"  says  he,  "  were  broken  up  towards 
the  south  pole,  and  the  progress  of  the  waters  was  northward, 
it  is  evident  that  the  southern  regions  must  have  been  first 
inundated,  and  "  (supernaturally  as  he  thinks,)  "  the  waters 
may  have  been  impelled  forward,  leaving  the  mountains  of 
the  regions  behind  them  dry,  as  soon  as  all  the  living 
creatures  in  these  mountains  were  destroyed.  This  could  be 
done  by  a  change  of  the  centre  of  gravity,  or  by  many  other 
means  easy  to  Omnipotence  ;  and  if  such  was  the  case,  much 


OX   THE    EXTENT    OF    NOAIl's    FLOOD.  191 

of  the  difficulty  respecting  the  quantity  of  water  necessary  to 
overwhelm  the  whole  earth,  is  at  once  removed."  (See 
Gleig's  History  of  the  Bible,  vol.  1,  pages  80  and  85.) 
This  last  mode  of  accounting  for  the  deluge,  differs  from  that 
advanced  by  Hooke  and  advocated  by  Fairholme,  in  that  it 
supposes  the  waters,  after  sweeping  by  degrees  over  the  sur- 
face of  the  dry  land,  leaving  the  earth  drained  behind  as  it  pro- 
gresses, to  pass  again  into  and  settle  in  their  ancient  bed ; 
whereas  according  to  those  writers,  there  was  ^permanent  inter- 
change of  sea  and  dry  land  occurring  at  the  time  of  the 
Flood.  Those  who  do  not  feel  prepared  to  embrace  either  of 
these  two  last  named  but  somewhat  resembling  theories,  im- 
agine that  neither  of  them  can  be  exactly  reconciled  with  the 
words  of  the  Mosaic  account :  not  the  former,  because  it  con- 
templates such  a  violent  rushing  of  the  waters  over  the  land 
—  an  idea  not  suggested  by  the  Mosaic  narrative ;  which, 
likewise,  contrary  to  that  theory,  seems  to  convey  the  idea  of 
a  simultaneous  covering  of  all  the  dry  land  ;  —  not  the  latter, 
because  the  same  land  which  was  inundated,  seems,  accord- 
ing to  Moses'  description,  to  have  again  emerged,  —  that 
there  was  a  retiring  or  subsiding  of  the  waters  into  their 
ancient  beds.  We  leave  you,  young  gentlemen,  to  examine 
at  your  leisure  and  see,  whether  the  scriptural  account  and 
these  theories,  or  either  of  them,  can  be  made  to  coalesce. 

Another  objection  to  the  flood's  absolute  universality  is, 
the  difficulty  of  affording  ample  room  in  the  ark  for  pairs  of 
unclean,  and  septuples  of  clean  animals,  of  absolutely  every 
kind  of  each  of  these  denominations  to  be  found  on  the  entire 
globe.  The  number  of  species  already  described  by  zoolo- 
gists has  been  said  to  be  not  less  than  150,000  ;  and  the 
probable  number  existing  on  the  globe  is  conjectured  to  be 
not  less  than  half  a  million.  And  for  the  greater  number  of 
these  must  provision  have  been  made,  since  most  of  them  in- 
habit either  the  air  or  the  dry  land.  A  thousand  species  of 
mammalia,  6000  species  of  birds,  2000  species  of  reptiles, 


192  ON    THE    EXTENT    OF   NOAH'S    FLOOD. 

and  120,000  species  of  insects,  are  already  described,  says 
the  objector,  and  must  have  been  provided  with  space  and 
food.  Will  any,  it  is  emphatically  asked,  belieye  this 
possible,  in  a  vessel  -of  no  more  capacity  than  Moses  men- 
tions ? 

The  objection,  thus  stated,  appears  formidable  truly.  Yet 
those  who  hold  that  the  deluge  was  universal,  endeavor 
to  maintain  the  ark's  adequate  capacity.  In  the  first  place, 
in  regard  to  the  ark's  dimensions,  they  say  the  cubit 
which  Moses  mentions  was  not  the  ordinary  one  of  eighteen 
inches,  as  was  demonstrated  by  Mr.  Greaves,  who, 
measuring  the  pyramids  in  Egypt,  and  comparing  the 
accounts  which  Herodotus,  Strabo,  and  others  give  of  their 
size,  found  the  length  of  a  cubit  to  be  ^lyVotf  inches.  Such 
being  the  ancient  cubit,  the  ark  must  have  been  547  feet  in 
length;  91  feet  2  inches  in  breadth;  and  54  feet  8  inches  in 
height.  In-the  above  calculation  the  decimals  are  omitted, 
which,  if  taken  into  the  account,  would  have  considerably 
increased  the  capacity.  Now,  if  along  with  the  enormous 
magnitude  of  the  vessel,  it  be  considered  that  the  term  spe- 
cies is  applied  oftentimes  to  varieties  of  what  belong  in 
reality  to  the  same  species,  thus  greatly  reducing  the  recently 
named  numbers  of  species  in  the  department  of  animated 
nature ;  and  if,  %oing  still  farther,  we  say  with  Dr.  Adam 
Clarke,  "  it  is  a  question  whether  in  this  (Mosaic)  account, 
any  but  the  different  GENERA  of  animals  necessary  to  be 
brought  into  the  ark,  should  be  included ; "  —  then  the  ob- 
jection appears  to  lose  very  much  of  its  formidableness,  to 
say  the  least.  And  if,  in  addition  to  all  hitherto  said,  we 
make  the  number  of  clean  creatures  small  —  as  must  have 
been  the  case  if  at  that  period  only  animals  proper  for 
sacrifice  were  so  called,  —  and  that  the  sevens  specified  in 
regard  to  these,  may  be  regarded  as  meaning  not  seven  pairs, 
but  seven  singles  (as  if  three  couples  for  brocd,  and  the  odd 
seventh  for  sacrifice,)  for  the  language  is  '<  by  $crens"t—  the 


ON   THE    EXTENT    OF   NOAH'S    FLOOD.  193 

objection  is  then  so  weakened,  that  many  will  regard  it  as  of 
little  force ;  more  especially  when,  added  to  all  the  foregoing, 
it  could  be  'and  has  been  plead,  that  of  all  the  living 
creatures  entering  the  ark,  "  the  vastly  greater  proportion 
were  small,  and  numbers  of  them  could  be  placed  together  in 
the  same  compartment ; "  and  that  "  many  animals,  also,  are 
torpid  during  the  winter,  and  would  probably  lie  dormant 
during  the  long  and  wintry  storm  of  the  deluge  ;  —  while,  for 
all  of  them,  much  less  than  the  usual  amount  of  food  would 
suffice,  in  consequence  of  their  inactivity  during  the  whole 
period  of  their  confinement  in  a  floating  vessel." 

But  if  the  ark  were  capacious  enough  to  hold  specimens  of 
all  kinds  of  living  creatures,  yet  It  is  objected  that  all  kinds 
of  them  could  not  have  been  preserved  in  the  ark,  because  of 
a  want  of  power  in  all  kinds  to  accommodate  themselves  to  any 
one  climate.  So  true  is  this,  it  is  urged,  that  if  tropical  ani- 
mals were  to  be  removed  to  the  temperate  zones,  and 
especially  to  the  frigid  regions,  they  could  not  long  survive  ; 
and  that  almost  equally  fatal  would  it  be  for  the  animals  of 
high  latitudes  to  take  up  their  abode  near  the  equator. 
Hence  specimens  of  the  various  kinds  coming  from  the  differ- 
ent climates  to  which  they  are  adapted,  could  not,  especially 
for  so  long  a  time  as  the  deluge  continued,  have  lived  togeth- 
er in  the  one  floating  vessel  of  Noah.'  The  fact  in  the  way 
of  reply  to  this,  has  been  urged,  that  travelling  menageries 
contain  collections  of  animals  of  a  great  variety  of  kinds  not 
only,  but  from  various  and  very  different  climates  and  widely 
separated  localities.  "The  white  bear  from  the  Arctic 
ocean,  the  lion  from  the  burning  deserts  of  Africa,  the  tiger 
from  the  jungles  of  Bengal,  the  elephant  from  Ceylon,  the 
llama  from  South  America,  the  orang-outang  from  Borneo, 
and  even  the  kangaroo  from  New  Holland,  with  the  arma- 
dillo of  Central  America,  and  the  bear  of  the  Rocky  moun- 
tains, have  been  known  to  exist  for  many  months  and  even 
years,  side  by  side,  in  the  same  menagerie ;  "  —  and  that 


194  ON    THE    EXTENT    OF   NOAIl's    FLOOD. 

% 

"  during  the  continuance  of  the  deluge  the  temperature  of 
the  atmosphere  would  probably  Jbe  a  medium  between  the 
intense  cold  of  the  Arctic,  and  the  fiery  heat  of  the  tropics, 
—  a  temperature  in  which  all  animals  could  exist  for  a  con- 
siderable length  of  time." 

Again:  It  has  been  objected  to  an  absolutely  universal 
deluge,  that  it  would  cause  a  mixture  of  the  salt  and  fresh 
waters  of  the  globe.  But  many  of  the  marine  fishes  and 
mollusks  could  live  alone  in  salt  water,  it  is  argued  ;  and  the 
fresh-water  ones  would  be  destroyed,  it  is  urged,  by  being 
kept  even  a  short  time  in  salt  water ;  whilst  some  species, 
though  they  can  indeed  live  in  brackish  water,  would  still  be 
affected  fatally,  in  all  probability,  by  such  circumstances  as 
the  increased  volume  of  water,  and  the  scattering  and  float- 
ing away  of  their  nutriment.  There  would  of  necessity  then 
be  a  vast  if  not  entire  destruction  of  aquatic  animals. 

There  is  an  attempt  to  meet  this  objection,  not  by  denying 
that  there  exists  a  distinction  of  the  kind  which  the  objection 
contemplates,  but  by  questioning  the  soundness  of  the  infer- 
ence in  its  full  extent  which  is  deduced  from  it.  Is  it  a 
settled  truth  that  salt-water  fishes  and  mollusks  cannot  live  a 
while  in  water  somewhat  less  salt;  and  that  fresh-water 
fishes  cannot  subsist  for  a  season  in  a  less  fresh  element  ? 
But  even  supposing  all  the  living  tenants  of  fresh  water  to 
have  perished,  might  there  not  have  been  a  provision  for 
replenishing  the  fresh  waters  with  living  stores  by  means  of 
spawn  here  and  there  plentifully  and  safely  deposited  ? 
"  May  it  not  even  be  true,"  it  is  asked,  "  that  the  germs  of 
animal  life  lie  imbedded  at  this  very  moment  beneath  the 
stratum  forming  the  bed  of  the  ocean,  and  that  they  are  so 
guarded  by  surrounding  mud,  and  the  immense  pressure  of 
ocean's  waters,  from  all  action  of  the  atmosphere,  and  from 
all  escape  of  vital  moisture  and  gas,  that  vitality  still  exists 
there ;  —  so  that  when,  ages  hence,  the  present  ocean-bed 
shall  be  upheaved,  it  shall  bring  with  it  to  the  sun  and  air, 


ON   THE   EXTENT    OF   NOAH'S   FLOOD.  195 

the  seeds  of  appropriate  animal  no  less  than  of  vegetable  life 
in  countless  myriads  ?  And  why  may  it  not  have  been  thus 
with  lands  upheaved  at  the  deluge  ? " 

A  difficulty  which  geology  is  thought  to  present  against 
the  absolute  universality  of  the  Mosaic  Flood  is  stated  by  Dr. 
Pye  Smith  in  his  "  Scripture  and  Geology,"  pp.  126-131. 
We  will  give  you  a  mere  hint  in  regard  to  its  character.  "  In 
a  district  more  than  forty  miles  in  length  and  twenty  in 
breadth,  in  the  southern  part  of  Central  France  —  comprised 
in  the  ancient  provincial  divisions  of  Auvergne  and  Langue- 
doc  —  are  the  unquestionable  cones,  craters,  and  other  charac- 
teristic remains  of  more  than  two  hundred  volcanic  hills  and 
mountains.  These,  in  former  periods  of  our  planet's  history, 
have  projected  their  tremendous  fiery  masses,  ashes  and 
water,  into  the  air  ;  and  vast  streams  of  melted  rocks  along 
the  ground."  Passing  over  much  that  is  said  —  "  many  of 
these  hills,  in  the  form  of  sugar-loaves,  consist  of  or  are 
coated  over  with  pumice  stones  and  other  loose  and  light 
substances,  which  every  person  knows  to  be  volcanic  prod- 
ucts. It  is  self-evident  that  these  could  not  have  withstood 
the  action  of  a  flood :  they  must  have  been  broken  down 
and  washed  away  with  the  first  rush  of  water.  Either  then 
the  eruptions  which  produced  them,  took  place  since  the  del- 
uge ;  or  that  deluge  did  not  reach  to  this  part  of  the  earth. 
Against  the  former  side  of  this  alternative  the  argument 
from  analogy  is  very  strong."  An  attempt  to  meet  this  ar- 
gument against  the  flood's  universality  you  may  find  in 
"The  Friend  of  Moses,"  pp.  361-369,  —  which,  along  with 
Dr.  Pye  Smith's  statement,  we  hope  you  will  look  at  when 
convenient. 

Finally :  There  has  been  an  objection  urged  not  only 
against  the  flood's  universality,  but  against  the  occurrence 
indeed  of  any  such  event  as  the  deluge  of  Noah  at  the  period 
assigned  by  the  Mosaic  annals,  —  an  objection  based  on  the 
records  of  some  Oriental  Nations,  as  the  Egyptians,  Chinese, 


196  ON   THE    EXTENT    OF   NOAH'S    FLOOD. 

etc.,  assigning  them  an  antiquity  far  back  beyond  that  of  the 
Noachic  cataclysm.  We  shall  not  here  consider  how  this 
objection  has  been  or  may  be  met.  As  a  question  of  an 
ethnological  character  will  hereafter,  Providence  permitting, 
at  some  time  demand  our  attention,  the  validity  of  those 
claims  put  forth  by  the  nations  alluded  to,  to  an  origin  so 
vastly  ancient,  will  then  be  examined.  We  imagine  that 
whether  the  deluge  of  Noah  was  or  was  not  universal,  it  may 
then  be  pretty  clearly  shown  that  this  matter  can  with  no 
propriety  be  urged  in  proof  either  against  the  occurrence  of 
such  an  event,  or  against  its  absolute  universality. 

From  what  has  by  us  been  now  advanced,  in  the  form  of 
argument,  on  each  side  of  the  question  relating  to  the  extent 
of  the  Noachic  deluge,  you  may  feel  yourselves  not  exactly 
prepared  to  come  to  a  determinate  conclusion,  whether  that 
inundation  was,  or  was  not,  absolutely  universal.  Inasmuch 
as,  whilst  the  language  of  Moses,  employed  in  describing  the 
flood  appears,  when  most  literally  interpreted,  to  teach  its 
universality,  yet,  as  we  have  seen,  can  be,  as  to  its  universal 
terms,  so  construed  as  to  suffer  our  faith  to  cling  with  unre- 
laxing  tenacity  to  the  verity  of  the  Mosaic  account,  without 
deciding,  firmly  and  finally,  that  it  could  have  been  of  no  less 
extent ;  and  inasmuch  as  you  are  yet  in  the  May-time  of 
life,  and  so,  in  the  clemency  of  a  benignant  Providence,  you 
may  be  afforded  an  unstinted  opportunity  to  examine  the 
subject,  in  its  every  feature  and  relation,  more  thoroughly, 
we  would  not  deem  it  advisable  for  you  at  present  to  pro- 
nounce dogmatically  an  opinion  on  one  side  or  the  other. 
While  this  is  said  by  us,  however,  we  do  hope  you  feel 
prepared  to  declare,  that  neither  the  language  of  the  Mosaic 
description,  nor  that  used  directly  by  the  Deity  to  our  patriarch, 
wherein  he  says,  "  neither  shall  there  any  more  be  a  flood  to 
destroy  the  earth ; "  as  well  as  what  is  embraced  in  the  pas- 
sages preceding  and  succeeding  this  declaration,  from  the  9th 
to  the  end  of  the  17th  verse  of  the  9th  chapter  of  Genesis, 


ON   THE    EXTENT    OP   NOAH*S    FLOOD.  197 

and  chapter  8th,  verses  21st  and  22d;  together  with  the 
credible  evidence  formerly  adduced  in  support  of  the  idea 
that  the  antediluvian  population  had  become  numerically  very 
great,  —  that  neither  all  combined,  nor  any  of  these  things, 
will,  in  your  view,  allow  you  to  conclude  that  the  flood  of 
Noah  was  not  so  extraordinary,  or  remarkably  peculiar,  but 
that  there  have  been,  and  in  all  likelihood  hereafter  will  be, 
inundations  of  very  similar  character,  both  as  to  extent  and 
otherwise,  or  indeed  either. 

It  is  to  be  presumed  that  no  great  degree  of  regret  will  be 
felt  rising  in  your  minds  at  the  perceptible  indications  of  a 
close  being  about  to  be  put  to  our  extended  remarks  on  the 
event  which,  for  so  many  evenings,  has  been  occupying  our 
attention.  Some  of  your  minds,  indeed,  may  not  have  been 
entirely  barren  of  wonder,  that  we  should  have  imagined  it 
needful  or  expedient  to  dwell  so  long  on  this  theme.  Had 
we,  young  gentlemen,  indulged  the  suspicion  that  you  were 
affected  with  the  "  yellow  cover "  malady,  we  should  have 
some  time  since  relinquished  the  subject,  or  rather  should 
have  never  consented  to  commence  it,  nor  indeed  any  part  of 
this  series  of  Evening  Exercises.  There  are  those  in  mul- 
titudes, before  whom  we  would  never  think  of  opening  our 
mouth  on  any  of  the  themes  embraced  in  this  "course." 
Other  things  in  abundance  they  can  find,  better  suited  to  their 
capacities,  as  well  as  more  congenial  to  their  tastes.  It  is 
not  worth  while  to  waste  time  or  words  in  finding  fault  with 
their  preferences.  There  must  be  mental  as  well  as  physical 
nonenities  or  vacuities  in  the  world.  It  would  not  be  a 
world,  so  to  speak,  without  them.  And  it  would  seem  a 
great  pity  if  nothing  appropriate  could  be  found  to  introduce 
into  those  spaces  of  emptiness.  If  "  nature  abhors  a  vacuum," 
pray,  why  may  we  not  ?  You,  young  gentlemen,  were,  we 
trust,  born  for  a  higher  destiny  than  that  of  merely  inhaling 
the  wind,  or  even  the  malaria  of  pestilential  marshes. 


198  CALL    FOR   THE    DISCUSSION. 

In  the  circumstance  that  the  Deluge  was  so  prominent  an 
event  in  the  lifetime  of  our  patriarch,  may  be  descried  a 
plausible  reason  for  making  it  so  prominent  a  theme  in  a 
course  of  lectures  on  "Noah  and  his  Times"  It  is  not, 
however,  so  much  for  the  purpose  of  adapting  our  exercises 
to  the  just  named  title,  that  we  have  drawn  so  heavily  on 
your  "bank"  of  patience,  as  because  of  the  fact  that  skepticism 
is  at  present  audaciously  and  assiduously  occupying  itself  in 
attempts  to  discover  and  urge  startling  disparities  and  irrecon- 
cilable discrepancies  between  the  recently  ascertained  facts,  or 
remarkable  modern  discoveries,  of  science,  and  the  teachings 
of  our  venerated  and  sacred  volume,  in  regard  particularly  to 
Creation  and  the  Deluge.  There  is  also  another  reason,  not 
altogether  isolated  from  the  preceding,  for  entering  so  fully 
into  the  subject  which  has  been  so  much  before  us.  There 
is  still  not  an  inconsiderable  number  of  Bible  readers  who 
have  been  so  taught  to  interpret  the  initial  part  of  Genesis,  as 
to  harbor  an  opinion  conflicting  with  the  findings  of  science ; 
and  who,  moreover,  have  been  accustomed  to  indulge  the 
belief,  that  all  fossil  organic  remains,  whether  imbedded  in 
the  rocky  strata,  or  overlying  them,  almost  every  where  to 
be  detected  on  this  planet,  were  borne  and  deposited  thither 
by  the  deluge  of  Noah,  and  are  themselves  indisputable 
evidences  of  that  event.  When  such  persons  hear  for  the 
first  time,  or  hear  barely,  what  geologists  and  naturalists  aver 
from  investigation  as  ascertained  principles,  or  settled  facts, 
—  principles  or  facts  bearing  on  these  points,  —  one  or  other 
of  the  following  things  is  likely  to  take  place :  —  Either  they 
will  have  their  faith  shaken,  or  hearts  tortured  with  suspi- 
cion, concerning  the  credibility  of  the  Mosaic  history;  their 
hostility  or  unfriendly  jealousy  awakened  toward  sciences 
which  threaten  to  uproot  or  ignore  those  previously  imbibed 
opinions  of  which  we  have  just  made  mention ;  —  or,  on  the 
other  hand,  by  conceitedly  and  pertinaciously  adhering  to 
them,  and  fiercely  charging  all  with  being  infidels,  or  favor- 


CALL    FOR   THE   DISCUSSION.  199 

ing  their  cause,  who  teach  or  hold  differently,  —  help  to 
confirm  the  really  skeptical  in  their  anti-biblical  doubts  and 
prejudices.  Solicitous  we  cannot  but  be,  young  gentlemen, 
that  you  should  be  qualified  correctly  to  interpret  both  Nature 
and  Scripture  relative  to  the  interesting  and  important  mat- 
ters in  question ;  and  be  instrumental  in  leading  others  to  the 
possession  of  intelligent  and  truthful  sentiments  respecting 
them. 


EVENING    FIFTEENTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

We  cannot  consent  to  conclude  our  remarks  in  relation  to 
the  Noachic  cataclysm  without  dropping  a  word  in  regard  to 
what  we  conceive  to  be  an  important  element,  so  to  speak,  in 
the  agencies  giving  rise  to,  or  somehow  connected  with,  the 
phenomena  of  that  stupendous  diluvial  occurrence.  Some 
even  Christian  philosophers,  appear  to  have  a  strong  as  well 
as  strange  disinclination  to  assign  to  aught  save  the  operation 
of  natural  principles  or  agencies,  whatever,  whether  as  to 
origin  or  otherwise,  pertains  to  this  event.  We  are  free  to 
say  that  we  cannot  enroll  ourselves  among  the  number  who 
imagine  it  to  have  been  brought  about  solely  by  natural 
means :  —  we  say,  solely,  —  for  that  there  was  an  entire  ab- 
sence of  the  operation  of  natural  or  secondary  causes,  even 
the  sacred  narrative  does  not  allow  us  to  believe  :  —  making 
mention,  as  you  perceive,  of  the  descending  rain  and  the 
issuing  forth  of  the  waters  from  oceanic  and  lesser  reposi- 
tories ;  and,  in  facilitating  the  subsidence  of  the  diluvial 
waters,  or  reappearance  of  dry  land,  the  blowing  of  a  wind 
over  the  liquid  surface  —  such  a  wind  as  produced  a  strong 
and  sudden  evaporation,  or  served  to  hasten  their  retirement 
to  the  reservoirs  they  had  left.  Whatever  natural  agencies 
or  existing  instrumentalities  the  Omnipotent  and  Infinitely 
Wise  might  choose,  were  of  course  concerned  in  the  accom- 


PRETERNATURAL     AGENCT.  201 

plisliment  of  what  Jehovah  had  purposed  in  regard  to  the 
corrupt  and  incorrigible  inhabitants  of  the  Old  World. 
Reasons  satisfactory  to  ourselves  we  find  for  not  excluding  or 
losing  sight  of  preternatural  agency  in  the  effecting  of  the 
destruction  of  those  millions  whom  God  did  not  deem  fit  to 
live.  Desire  you  from  us  a  statement  of  these  reasons? 
In  the  first  place,  then,  the  Scriptures  represent  the  Deluge 
as  a  strictly  punitive  event,  —  as  possessing  the  charac- 
ter of  a  judicial  infliction.  So  the  sacred  historian  ob- 
viously understood  it ;  so  he  designed  his  readers  to  believe. 
So  Noah  himself  understood  it,  and  manifestly  would 
have  his  descendants  in  every  generation,  and  everywhere, 
believe.  But  in  order  that  mankind  everywhere,  and  in 
every  age,  should  thus  believe,  and  be  suitably  and  salu- 
tarily impressed  by  it,  the  Deity  Supreme  would  see  to  hav- 
ing it  so  brought  about,  that  its  character  should  not  entirely 
be  wrapped  up  and  hid  in  the  operation  of  natural  agencies, 
or  secondary  causes.  God's  care  on  this  point  is  discernible 
in  the  fact  that  all  theories  which  have  attempted  to  account 
for  the  rise,  or  to  explain  the  various  phenomena  of  the 
Deluge  of  sacred  history,  which  have  failed  to  recognize 
immediate  divine  interposition  or  agency,  have  failed  likewise 
in  satisfying  the  mind  of  the  generality  of  those  who  have 
examined  them.  Infidels,  or  those  who  have  desired  to 
ignore  or  throw  discredit  upon  the  whole  Mosaic  account  — 
these  have  manifested  dissatisfaction  with  those  theories  — 
wanting,  as  those  men  do,  no  agency  natural  or  supernatural 
to  effect  an  event  which  they  profess  to  believe  never 
occurred ;  whilst  others,  who  are  not  infidels,  find  both  their 
faith  and  reason  demanding  the  operation  of  something  addi- 
tional to  and  above  that  of  strictly  natural  causes  —  as  are 
commonly  called  the  principles  or  powers  with  which  the 
Deity  has  invested  or  endowed  nature. 

Let  us  remark,  in  the  next  place,  that  if  you  will  look  at 
Gen.  6 :  7,  where  the  Lord  is  to  be  found  saying  to  himself, 


202        THE  FLOOD  OP  GENESIS  PRODUCED 

"  I  will  destroy  man,  whom  I  have  created,  from  the  face  of 
the  earth,"  etc. ;  and  into  the  13th  verse  of  the  same  chapter, 
where  he  is  to  be  found  saying  to  Noah,  "  The  end  of  all  flesh 
is  come  before  me ;  for  the  earth  is  filled  with  violence  through 
them ;  —  behold  I  will  destroy  them  with  the  earth,"  you 
will  hardly  be  able  to  convince  yourselves  that  the  Lord  ex- 
pressed to  himself  and  to  Noah,  merely  the  result  of  what  he 
foresaw  certain  powers  or  principles  in  nature,  after  the  inter- 
val of  a  specified  number  of  years,  of  themselves  solely,  unin- 
tensified,  undirected,  uncontrolled,  would  effect.  And  we 
cannot  find  it  in  our  heart  to  blame  you,  if  you  fail  of  ability 
to  convince  yourselves  of  this. 

Again.  To  me  it  appears  difficult  to  ponder  and  weigh  the 
full  import  and  force  of  that  emphatic  "  Behold  I,  EVEN  I,  do 
bring  a  flood  of  waters  upon  the  earth  to  destroy  all  flesh 
wherein  is  the  breath  of  life ; " —  a  declaration  of  God  which 
you  may  see  in  Gen.  6:  17,  —  and  yet  entertain  the  belief 
that  the  whole  diluvial  event  of  which  we  have  been  treating, 
was  brought  about  exclusively  by  natural  powers  or  laws. 
That  "I,  even  1, "  seems  to  me  to  present,  very  clearly,  and 
emphatically  too,  a  personal  and  supernatural  agent  as  oper- 
ating, and  not  mediately  only,  but  immediately,  in  bringing 
over  the  earth  the  sweeping  diluvial  judgment.  It  is  hard 
for  me  to  believe  that  that  17th  verse  contains  only  a  divine 
prediction  that  after  the  lapse  of  a  specified  number  of  years, 
natural  agencies  will  cause  an  inundation  which  will  prove 
generally  destructive  to  the  living  creatures  inhabiting  this 
planet ;  and  an  implied  announcement  on  the  part  of  God, 
that  he  did  not  intend  to  interfere  to  prevent  the  catastrophe, 
and  for  the  reason  that  mankind  had  become  so  wicked. 
And  again, —  When  I  read  that  language  from  the  lips  divine, 
contained  in  Gen.  8  :  21,  22,  a  part  of  which  is,  "  I  will  not 
again  curse  the  ground  any  more  for  man's  sake,  —  neither 
will  I  again  smite  any  more  every  living  thing  as  I  have 
done;"  and  when,  additionally,  in  Gen.  9:  11,  I  find  God 


NOT    SOLELY   BY   NATURAL    CAUSES.  203 

solemnly  as  well  as  formally  declaring  to  our  patriarch, 
"  I  will  establish  my  covenant  with  you  ;  neither  shall  all 
flesh  be  cut  off  any  more  by  the  waters  of  a  flood ; "  and 
examine  the  whole  paragraph  in  which  this  is  included,  my 
reason  will  not,  no  sound  principle  of  exegesis  will,  allow  me 
to  interpret  the  language  as  containing  barely  a  prediction 
that  there  never  will  be  again  such  an  operation  of  natural 
causes  as  to  bring  about  an  inundation  so  extensive  or  destruc- 
tive as  that  which  had  just  passed  away. 

If  any  professing  to  have  a  reverence  for  the  Bible  can, 
we  cannot,  either  erase  from  that  Book  of  books  or  explain 
away  the  record  of  the  many  miracles  which  we  there  find  ; 
the  revealed  numerous  instances,  in  both  Testaments,  of 
direct  divine  interposition  or  agency  to  effect  things  above  or 
beyond  what  the  powers  of  nature  alone  could  accomplish. 
And  we  are  left  to  infer  that  if,  on  numerous  other  occasions, 
and  for  less  important  ends,  the  Omnipotent  has  stepped 
from  his  throne  and  exerted  just  a  little  of  his  Almighti- 
ness  in  putting,  for  the  time,  an  efficiency  into  natural  powers 
or  principles  which  is  known  not  ordinarily  to  belong  to 
them  ;  or,  without  any  instrumentalities  at  all,  doing  such  or 
such  things  which  for  some  end  he  wished  to  be  accomplished ; 
then,  we  cannot  see  why,  for  a  greatly  paramount  end,  —  an 
end  so  very  momentous  as  that  for  which  the  earth  was 
visited  by  the  inundation  of  which  the  sacred  archaic  histo- 
rian speaks,  —  the  Infinite  One  should  not  put  forth  a  little  of 
his  boundless  power  to  produce  such  inundation.  And  that 
he  did  so,  whether  others  will  or  will  not,  we  will  and  must 
believe. 

But,  "  if  it  was  miraculous,  then  we  must  give  up  the  idea 
of  philosophizing  about  it,"  says  the  author  of  The  Religion 
of  Geology,  p.  127.  If  that  respected  author  means  by  this 
remark  that,  if  there  was  something  preternatural  introduced 
in  bringing  about  the  deluge,  we  are  thereby  precluded  from 
making  any  inquiries  in  reference  to  it,  we  cannot  see  how 


204        THE  FLOOD  OF  GENESIS  PRODUCED 

this  necessarily  follows.  It  appears  to  me  that  we  are  not 
deprived  of  the  liberty  of  inquiring  what  and  how  far  natural 
means  or  agencies  were  employed  in  relation  to  the  event. 
We  may  still,  it  strikes  me,  lawfully  inquire  whether  any, 
and,  if  any,  what  distinguishable  physical  traces  of  that 
occurrence  are  discoverable  at  this  day  on  the  globe.  We 
are  at  liberty  to  seek  for  responses,  both  from  the  written 
revelation  of  God,  and  the  material  or  physical  one,  to  such 
additional  interrogatories  as,  How  far  did  the  cataclysm  ex- 
tend? What  quantity  of  water  was  requisite  to  effect  it? 
Whence  came  it  ?  How  high  did  it  rise  ?  What  effects,  as 
to  kind  and  degree,  followed  to  animated  nature  ?  —  to  all 
questions,  in  short,  against  which  faith,  reverence,  and  reason 
would  not  issue  their  veto. 

Though  it  may  sound  much  like  a  truism,  yet  we  are  not 
without  our  object  in  saying  it,  that  there  are  some  things 
which  can  by  no  one  be  reverently  or  rightly  done.  No  one 
can,  with  due  reverence  or  propriety,  treat  the  Mosaic  testi- 
mony as  if  it  were  utterly  unworthy  of  credence  —  as  if  it  did 
not  possess  the  attributes  of  history  —  or,  as  if  it  ought  not  to 
be  received  as  such.  Nor,  in  the  light  or  face  of  that  testi- 
mony, that  history,  ought  any  set  of  men  to  act,  we  will  not 
say  so  deistically,  but  atheistically,  as  to  leave  unthought  of, 
or  suffer  to  remain  wholly  out  of  view,  the  Great  First  Cause, 
or  Supreme  and  Universal  Ruler,  in  their  inquiries  relative 
to  that  great  diluvial  occurrence  to  which  we  have  had  our 
thoughts  directed ;  nor  even  in  appearance  attempt  to  divest 
that  event  of  the  discernible  marks  of  a  special  divine  judg- 
ment inflicted  on  an  exceedingly  corrupt  and  incorrigibly 
wicked  world.  We  are  constrained  here  to  express  our 
surprise  and  sorrow  that  some  even  Christian  divines, 
through  their  intense  fondness  for  philosophic  investigation 
or  inquiry,  have  allowed  themselves  to  speak  of  the  deluge 
of  Noah,  as  if  God  had  had  no  more,  directly,  to  do  with  it, 
than  he  has  with  the  steady  revolutions  of  the  planets  in  their 


NOT  8OLELY  BY  NATURAL  CAUSES.         205 

orbits,  or  any  other  event  occurring  under  the  ordinary  and 
sole  operation  or  control,  so  far  as  we  can  discover,  of  nature's 
principles  or  laws.  With  respect  to  these  men,  we  must  be 
permitted  to  say,  that  we  think  it  due  to  their  character  and 
position  not  to  proceed  in  their  speculations  or  inquiries  rela- 
tive to  the  Noachic  inundation,  so  much  as  if  there  were  no 
special  written  divine  testimony  concerning  it.  Let  not  this 
remark,  however,  be  considered  as  applying  to  more  than  a 
comparatively  few  of  those  occupying  that  position,  who  have 
published  the  results  of  their  speculations  or  inquiries  on  the 
subject.  It  is  only  here  and  there  one  that  has  become  so 
ambitious  or  fond  of  playing  the  philosopher,  as  wellnigh  to 
forget  that  there  is  a  Bible  conferred  by  a  benevolent  God  to 
serve  as  a  lamp  to  our  feet  and  a  light  to  our  path. 

If,  prompted  or  impelled  by  such  clear  scriptural  inti- 
mations as  have  been  referred  to,  we,  to  natural  causes  or 
agencies,  superadd  the  preternatural,  in  our  inquiries  respect- 
ing the  cause  or  causes  connected  with  the  diluvial  occurrence 
described  in  the  Mosaic  narrative ;  —  if,  not  natural  powers 
exclusively  were  concerned  in  bringing  it  about,  but,  along 
with,  or  at  their  head,  the  power  of  the  Omnipotent  is  to  be 
regarded  as  having  been  put  forth ;  —  then,  difficulties  such 
as  the  cavilling  mind  finds  in  the  way  of  the  occurrence  of 
just  such  a  deluge,  in  all  its  features,  as  the  archaic  historian, 
Moses,  describes,  are  at  once  given  to  the  winds :  for  where, 
where  are  to  be  found  such  difficulties  or  obstacles  as  to 
confront  or  defy  Omnipotence  ? 

If  you  have  not  hitherto  felt,  you  may  by  this  time  begin 
to  feel  a  desire  to  hear  where  the  ark  finally  stranded  or 
settled.  Where  was  it  that  the  inmates  of  the  floating  house, 
human  and  sub-human,  left  it,  again  to  take  up  their  abode  on 
dry  land?  The  Scriptures,  we  are  disposed  to  think,  do  not 
speak  so  determinately  on  this  point,  as  that  the  precise  spot 
can  be  certainly  ascertained.  Indeed,  had  they  spoken  thus, 

there  would  not,  among  biblical  interpreters,  have  prevailed 
10 


206         INQUIRY   AS   TO   THE   ARK'S   RESTING   PLACE. 

the  variety  of  conjecture  which  we  find.  The  Mosaic  history 
has  been  considered  as  containing  two  brief  statements  from 
which  to  arrive  at  an  opinion,  to  wit :  That  in  Gen.  8 :  4, 
where  it  is  said  that  "  the  ark  "  (at  a  time  which  it  specifies,) 
"  rested  upon  the  mountains  of  Ararat ;  "  —  and  that  in  11 :  2, 
where  we  read  concerning  the  Noachidae,  that  "  as  they 
journeyed  from  the  East,  they  found  a  plain  in  the  land  of 
Shinar,  and  they  dwelt  there."  The  phrase  "  mountains  of 
Ararat,"  in  the  former  of  the  two  passages  cited,  has  led  the 
major  number  of  expositors  to  locate  the  place  of  exodus  in 
Armenia.  The  word  Ararat  occurs  in  three  other  places  in 
the  Sacred  Scriptures,  2  Kings  19  :  37  ;  Isa.  37  :  38  ;  Jer. 
51 :  27  ;  —  in  the  first  two  of  which  it  is  rendered  Armenia. 
The  earliest  tradition  fixed  on  one  of  the  chain  of  mountains 
which  separate  Armenia  from  Mesopotamia,  and  which,  as 
they  also  inclose  Kurdistan,  (the  land  of  the  Kurds,)  ob- 
tained the  name  of  Kardu,  or  Carduchian  range,  corrupted 
into  Gordiaean  and  Cordyaean.  This  opinion  prevailed 
among  the  Chaldeans,  if  the  testimony  of  Berosus  as  quoted 
by  Josephus  may  be  relied  upon  :  "  It  is  said  there  is  still 
some  part  of  this  ship  in  Armenia,  at  the  mountain  of  the 
Cordyseans  ;  and  that  people  carry  off  pieces  of  the  bitumen, 
which  they  use  as  amulets."  (Antiq.  1 :  3,  6.)  From  that 
tradition,  doubtless  it  was,  that  Mohammed  was  led  to  say  in 
his  Koran,  (11  :  46)  "The  ark  rested  on  the  mountain  Al- 
Judi."  That  name  was  probably  a  corruption  of  Giordi,  i.  e. 
Gordisean  (the  designation  given  to  the  entire  range,)  but 
afterwards  applied  to  the  special  locality  where  the  ark  was 
supposed  to  have  rested.  This  is  on  a  mountain  a  little  to 
the  east  of  Jezizah  ibn  Omar  (the  ancient  Bezabde)  on  the 
Tigris.  This  tradition  respecting  the  locality  where  the  ark 
rested,  may  be  found  adopted  by  the  Chaldee  paraphrasts,  as 
well  as  by  the  Syriac  translators  and  commentators,  and  all 
the  Syrian  churches.  In  the  three  texts  where  "  Ararat" 
occurs,  the  Targum  of  Oakelos  has  1TO  Kardu;  and, 


INQUIRY  AS    TO    THE    ARK'S   RESTING   PLACE.         207 

according  to  Buxtorf,  the  term  "  Kardyan  "  was  in  Chaldee 
synonymous  with  "  Armenian."  At  Gen.  8 :  4,  we  are 
informed  that  the  Arabic  of  Erpenius  has  Jibal-el-Karud 
(the  mountain  of  the  Kurds)  which  is  likewise  found  in  the 
"  Book  of  Adam  "  of  the  Zabacans. 

Another  and  later  tradition,  and  one  which  has  been  more 
commonly  adopted  by  Christians  of  the  Occident,  makes  the 
ark  to  have  rested  on  a  great  mountain  in  the  north  of  Ar- 
menia. Such  influence  had  this  tradition  on  the  popular 
belief,  as  in  course  of  time  to  give  to  that  towering  eminence 
the  name  of  Ararat  —  as  if  no  doubt  could  be  entertained 
that  it  was  the  Ararat  of  the  Scriptures.  The  native  Arme- 
nians called  it  Macis,  and  the  Turks  Aghur-dagh  or  Agri- 
dagh,  i.  e.  "  The  Heavy  or  Great  Mountain."  The  Persians 
call  it  Kuhi  Nuch,  Noah's  mountain.  The  Armenian  ety- 
mology of  the  name  of  the  city  of  Nachchevan  (which  lies 
east  of  it)  is  said  to  be  "  the  first  place  of  descent  or  lodg- 
ing ; "  being  regarded  as  the  place  where  Noah  resided  after 
descending  from  the  mount.  This  mountain,  now  going 
among  western  nations  under  the  name  Ararat,  consists  of 
two  immense  conical  elevations,  the  altitude  of  the  taller 
being  17,750  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea,  and  14,573  feet 
above  the  level  of  the  plain;  that  of  the  lower  13,420  feet 
above  the  sea,  and  10,435  feet  above  the  plain  ;  thus  tower- 
ing in  massive  and  majestic  grandeur  from  the  valley  of  the 
Aras,  the  ancient  Araxes.  The  Rev.  Eli  Smith  says  of  it, 
"  Not  among  the  mountains  of  Ararat,  certainly,  or  of  Ar- 
menia generally,  nor  those  of  any  part  of  the  world  where  I 
have  been,  have  I  ever  seen  one  whose  majesty  could  plead 
half  so  powerfully  its  claims  to  the  honor  of  having  once  been 
the  stepping  stone  between  the  Old  World  and  the  New.  I 
gave  myself  up  to  the  feeling,  that  on  its  summit  were  once 
congregated  all  the  inhabitants  of  the  earth  ;  and  that,  while 
in  ,the  valley  of  the  Araxes,  I  was  paying  a  visit  to  the 
second  cradle  of  the  human  race.  Nor  can  I  allow  my 


208         INQUIRY   AS    TO   THE    ARK*S    RESTING   PLACE. 

opinion  to  be  at  all  shaken  by  the  Chaldee  paraphrasts,  the 
Syrian  translators  and  commentators,  and  the  traditions  of 
the  whole  family  of  Syrian  churches  which  translate  the 
passage  in  question,  *  mountains  of  the  Kurds' "  —  Sir 
Robert  Ker  Porter  thus  graphically  describes  this  stupendous 
work  of  nature  :  —  "As  the  vale  opened  beneath  us,  in  our 
descent,  my  whole  attention  became  absorbed  in  the  view 
before  me.  A  vast  plain  peopled  with  countless  villages,  the 
towers  and  spires  of  the  churches  of  Eitch-mia-adzen  arising 
from  amidst  them ;  the  glittering  waters  of  the  Araxes  flow- 
ing through  the  fresh  green  of  the  vale ;  and  the  subordinate 
range  of  mountains  skirting  the  base  of  the  awful  monument 
of  the  antediluvian  world,  it  seemed  to  stand  a  stupendous 
link  in  the  history  of  man,  uniting  the  two  races  of  men 
before  and  after  the  flood.  But  it  was  not  until  we  had 
arrived  upon  the  flat  plain,  that  I  beheld  Ararat  in  all  its 
amplitude  of  grandeur.  From  the  spot  on  which  I  stood,  it 
appeared  as  if  the  hugest  mountains  of  the  world  had  been 
piled  upon  each  other,  to  form  this  one  sublime  immensity  of 
earth,  and  rock,  and  snow.  The  icy  peaks  of  its  double 
heads  rose  majestically  into  the  clear  and  cloudless  heavens  ; 
the  sun  blazed  bright  upon  them,  and  the  reflection  sent  forth 
dazzling  radiance  equal  to  other  suns.  My  eye,  not  able  to 
rest  for  any  length  of  time  upon  the  blinding  glory  of  its 
summits,  wandered  down  the  apparently  interminable  sides, 
till  I  could  no  longer  trace  their  vast  lines  in  the  mists  of  the 
horizon ;  when  an  irrepressible  impulse  immediately  carrying 
my  eye  upwards  again,  refixed  my  gaze  on  the  awful  glare 
of  Ararat;  and  this  bewildered  sensibility  of  sight  being 
answered  by  a  similar  feeling  in  the  mind,  for  some  moments 
I  was  lost  in  a  strange  suspension  of  the  powers  of  thought." 
Of  the  two  separate  peaks,  called  the  Little  and  the  Great 
Ararat,  which  are  separated  by  a  chasm  about  seven  miles 
in  width,  Sir  Robert  thus  speaks:  —  "These  inaccessible 
summits  have  never  been  trodden  by  the  foot  of  man  since 


INQUIRY   AS   TO   THE   ARS/S   RESTING   PLACE.         209 

the  days  of  Noah,  if  even  then  ;  for  my  idea  is,  that  the  ark 
rested  in  the  space  between  these  heads,  and  not  on  the  top 
of  either.  Various  attempts  have  been  made  in  different 
ages  to  ascend  these  tremendous  mountain  pyramids,  but  in 
vain.  Their  form,  snows,  and  glaciers  are  insurmountable 
obstacles  ;  the  distance  being  so  great  from  the  commence- 
ment of  the  icy  regions  to  the  highest  points,  cold  alone 
would  be  the  destruction  of  any  person  who  should  have  the 
hardihood  to  persevere." 

At  the  time  when  Sir  R.  K.  Porter's  Travels  were  pub- 
lished, and  indeed  until  some  twenty-five  or  thirty  years 
since,  the  summit  of  this  lofty  mountain  was  considered  abso- 
lutely inaccessible.  Attempts  had  at  various  times  been 
made  to  reach  its  top,  but  beyond  the  limit  of  perpetual 
snow  scarcely  any  succeeded  in  planting  their  feet.  In  the 
year  1700,  the  French  traveller  Tournefort  persevered  long, 
and  in  the  face  of  many  difficulties,  but  was  foiled  in  the  end. 
Early  in  the  present  century  the  Pasha  of  Bayazeed  under- 
took the  ascent,  but  with  success  no  better.  In  1829,  a  Dr. 
Parrot  claimed  the  honor  of  first  reaching  the  summit  of  this 
towering  eminence.  Taking  with  him  a  Mr.  Behagel  as 
mineralogist,  Messrs.  Hehn  and  Schiemann,  medical  students 
of  Moscow,  and  Mr.  Foderow,  astronomer  of  St.  Petersburg, 
he  undertook  and  accomplished  the  remarkable  achievement. 
An  account  of  his  ascent,  extracted  from  a  work  published 
by  Professor  Parrot  at  Berlin,  may  be  founct  in  the  Foreign 
Quarterly  Review  for  June,  1835.  It  is  quite  interesting, 
but  too  long  to  allow  me  to  give  it  to  you  here.  Twice  was 
he  repelled,  it  is  said,  by  the  snowy  crest ;  but  in  th«  third 
attempt  he  succeeded,  after  almost  unparalleled  effort,  in 
reaching  its  lofty  pinnacle.  He  found  himself  on  a  slightly 
convex  and  almost  circular  platform,  two  hundred  and  twenty 
feet  in  diameter,  which  at  the  extremity  declined  rather  steeply 
on  all  sides.  This  was  the  silver  crest  of  Ararat,  composed 
of  eternal  ice,  unbroken  by  a  rock  or  stone.  On  account  of 


210         INQUIRY   AS    TO    THE    ARK*S    RESTING   PLACE. 

the  immense  distance,  nothing  could  be  seen  distinctly.  The 
whole  valley  of  the  Araxes  was  covered  with  a  grey  mist, 
through  which  the  towns  of  Erivan  and  Sardarabad  appeared 
as  small  dark  spots.  To  the  E.  S.  E.  was  the  lesser  Ararat, 
whose  head,  as  viewed  from  this  higher  point,  did  not  appear 
like  a  cone,  as  it  does  from  the  plain,  but  like  the  top  of  a 
square  truncated  pyramid,  with  larger  and  smaller  rocky 
elevations  at  the  edges  and'  in  the  middle.  The  party  spent 
three  quarters  of  an  hour,  we  are  told,  on  its  summit,  and 
then,  after  planting  an  oaken  cross  thereon,  descended.  In 
their  descent,  "  it  was  a  splendid  sight  to  behold  the  dark 
shadows  which  the  mountains  on  the  west  cast  upon  the 
plain,  and  then  the  profound  darkness  which  covered  all  the 
valleys,  and  which  rose  gradually  higher  and  higher  on  the 
side  of  Ararat,  whose  icy  summit  was  still  illuminated  by  the 
beams  of  the  setting  sun." 

The  fact  of  such  an  ascent  as  that  which  Dr.  Parrot  pro- 
fesses to  have  accomplished  is  indeed,  it  is  said,  doubted  by 
the  Armenians,  but  their  incredulity  is  based  upon  their  su- 
perstition. They  firmly  believe  that  on  the  top  of  that 
mountain  is  Noah's  ark  existing  at  the  present  day,  and  that 
in  order  to  preserve  it  an  approach  is  to  no  one  allowed. 
This  tradition,  which  is  founded  upon  some  monkish  legend, 
has  received  the  sanction  of  the  church,  and  become  in  effect 
an  article  of  faith  which  an  Armenian  would  scarcely  renounce 
even  were  he  in  person  placed  on  that  very  summit  where 
he  believes  it  in  undecaying  perfection  to  be. 

It  was  so  early  as  at  the  end  of  one  hundred  and  fifty 
days,.or  five  months,  after  the  deluge  commenced,  that  the 
ark  is  said,  to  have  "  rested  on  the  mountains  of  Ararat," 
(Gen.  8 :  4.)  Now  if  by  the  resting  there  spoken  of,  be 
meant  a  grounding  and  permanent  resting,  it  appears  to  us 
strange  that  from  being  so  high  as  fifteen  cubits  above  that, 
and  even  loftier  eminences  on  the  globe,  the  waters  should 
have  been  at  this  time  only  of  such  height  as  that  a  final 


INQUIRY   AS    TO    THE    ARK'S    RESTING   PLACE.         211 

stranding  could  have  taken  place,  and  yet  the  process  of 
exsiccation  or  abatement  afterward  be  so  slow  that  the 
tops  of  the  mountains  should  not  be  visible  until  some 
two  and  a  half  months  subsequently,  —  which,  by  looking 
at  the  fifth  verse  of  the  eighth  chapter  and  comparing 
with  the  verse  preceding,  you  will  perceive  to  have  been 
the  fact.  But  this  is  not  the  most  formidable  objection 
which  may  be  urged  against  that  interpretation  of  the 
fourth  verse  which  makes  the  resting  of  the  ark  there 
spoken  of,  to  denote  a  stranding,  and  that  not  simply,  but  such 
a  stranding  as  to  involve  a  permanent  settlement.  For  then 
it  must  have  been  from  that  eminence  that  there  was  an 
egression  of  the  Noachic  family,  together  with  all  the  living 
inferior  creatures  which  had  been  preserved  in  it,  from  the 
ark,  and  the  finding  of  their  way  in  safety  far  down  the  pre- 
cipitous, rocky  and  icy  declivity  or  declivities  into  the  habit- 
able regions  below ;  —  a  thing  utterly  impracticable  without 
miraculous  interference  or  aid,  as  we  are  constrained  to  infer 
from  the  fact  to  which  our  attention  has  been  called,  viz., 
that  its  ascent  is  so  difficult  and  next  to  utterly  impracticable 
—  an  achievement  so  all  but  absolutely  transcending  human 
power,  that  notwithstanding  the  many  strenuous  efforts  that 
were  at  different  periods  put  forth  for  its  achievement,  the 
summit  was  never  actually  reached  from  below  until  a 
quarter  of  a  century  since,  and  then  only  after  almost  super- 
human exertion.  Hence  necessity  seems  to  be  laid  upon  us 
to  adopt  a  somewhat  different  interpretation,  either  of  the 
phrase  "mountains  of  Ararat"  or  of  the  word  "rested"  in 
Genesis  8 :  4.  But  it  being  time*  for  us  to  close,  the  con- 
sid(?ration  of  this  you  may  expect  to  introduce  the  next 
Exercise. 


EVENING   SIXTEENTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

Toward  arriving  at  a  correct  conclusion  as  to  the  particular 
locality  where  the  ark  finally  or  permanently  rested,  no  such 
determinate  assistance  can,  in  our  view,  be  derived  from  the 
phraseology  WT&  *nn  ^9  al  hare  Ararat,  rendered  "  upon  the 
mountains  of  Ararat"  as  the  great  majority  of  commentators 
appear  to  have  imagined.  It  may  well  be  inquired,  what 
authority  or  right  have  they  to  interpret  it  as  indicating  a 
particular  mountain,  now  known  by  the  name  Ararat,  situated 
in  modern  Armenia?  Does  it  not  seem  much  more  rational 
and  proper  to  understand  that  plural  phraseology  as  denoting 
a  mountainous  district  within  a  country  or  province  bearing 
the  denomination  of  Ararat? — just  as  the  expressions,  the 
mountains  of  Israel,  the  mountains  of  Samaria,  the  mountains 
of  Abarim,  etc.,  are  understood  to  denote  the  mountainous 
districts  of  those  countries.  The  sacred  historian,  then,  may 
be  regarded  as  not  intending,  by  the  phraseology  referred  to, 
to  designate  a  particular  mountain-top  as  that  on  which  the 
floating  fabric  found  a  lodgment  or  repose,  but  to  say,  in 
general  terms,  that  this  took  place  in  some  part  of  the  moun- 
tain range  which  distinguished  the  country  of  Ararat,  and  may 
be  believed  to  have  been  in  or  near  the  modern  Armenia.  — 
Should  it  be  contended,  in  favor  of  that  more  usual  interpre- 
tation of  commentators  which  has  been  mentioned,  that  the 


INQUIRY   AS    TO    THE    ARIv's    RESTING   PLACE.         213 

double  peak  of  Agridah  makes  the  plural  phraseology 
pertinent ;  and  that  the  ark,  as  we  have  observed  Sir  R.  K. 
Porter  to  think,  may  have  rested  in  the  valley  between  the 
two  peaks,  and  thus,  as  it  were,  on  the  two  mountains ;  it 
may  to  this  be  replied,  that,  since  we  are  told,  in  verse  fifth, 
that  it  was  not  until  the  first  of  the  tenth  month  that  the  tops 
of  the  mountains  were  seen,  it  is  not  possible  that  the  ark 
should  have  stranded  in  the  valley  between  the  two  peaks, 
and  far  below  their  tops,  some  two  and  a  half  months  anterior 
to  that  period. 

Next,  as  to  the  proper  interpretation  of  the  phrase  "  rested 
upon"  (or  the  original,)  in  the  same  verse,  (the  fourth,)  let  us 
drop  a  word.  Should  we  feel  disposed  to  entertain  favorably 
the  idea  thrown  out  by  the  Rev.  N.  Morren,  in  the  Article  "Ar- 
arat" of  Dr.  Kitto's  Cyclopedia,  we  shall  consider  the  sacred 
historian  as  still  farther  from  intending  to  point  out  a  particu- 
lar locality,  as  that  on  which  the  ark  found  a  final  lodgment. 
That  writer  thinks  that  it  may  be  fairly  questioned  whether 
the  Hebrew  words  translated  "rested  upon"  in  Genesis  8:  4, 
should  be  understood  as  meaning  an  actual  grounding  upon 
the  mountainous  region,  much  less  a  particular  mountain,  of 
Ararat.  Obtained  a  comparative  and  temporary  repose  over, 
expresses,  in  his  view,  the  import  of  the  original ;  or,  at  least, 
according  to  his  opinion,  the  words  of  the  Hebrew  are  to  be 
considered  susceptible  of  such  an  interpretation.  The  lan- 
guage of  Moses,  in  that  fourth  verse,  then,  may  be  regarded  as 
indicating  that  the  ark,  after  having  been  driven  and  tossed 
to  and  fro  on  the  waste  of  waters,  for  the  previous  five 
months,  obtained,  for  at  least  a  while,  a  measure  of  compara- 
tive repose,  and  became  more  stationary  over  (b2)  the 
mountainous  region  of  Ararat.  "That  this  may  be  the 
import  of  the  expression,"  says  Mr.  Morren,  "  will  be  denied 
by  none  who  are  acquainted  with  the  genius  of  the  Hebrew 
language,  and  with  the  latitude  of  meaning  attachable  to  the 
verb  rna,  which,  (as  is  observed  by  Taylor  in  his  Concord- 
10* 


214         INQUIRY   AS    TO   THE   ARK'S    RESTING   PLACE. 

ance,)  includes  whatever  comes  under  the  idea  of  ( remaining 
quietly  in  a  place  without  being  disturbed.'  A  vessel,"  he 
continues,  "  enjoys  more  real  rest,  when  becalmed,  than  when 
she  grounds  on  the  top  of  a  submarine  mountain  in  a  troubled 
sea."  If  such  an  interpretation  be  allowable,  and  we  fully 
believe  it  to  be,  it  is  easy  to  perceive  that  we  get  rid  of 
several  more  or  less  formidable  difficulties,  at  which  this 
writer  hints,  and  then  he  concludes  thus  :  —  "  Finally,  we,  on 
this  hypothesis,  solve  the  question,  'If  the  descendants  of 
Noah  settled  near  the  resting-place  of  the  ark,  in  Armenia, 
how  could  they  be  said  to  approach  the  plain  of  Shinar,  or 
Babylonia,  from  the  east?'  (Gen.  11 :  2.)  For,  as  we  read 
the  narrative,  the  precise  resting-place  of  the  ark  is  nowhere 
mentioned;  and  though,  for  a  time,  stationary  'over'  the 
mountains  of  Ararat,  it  may,  before  the  final  subsidence  of 
the  waters,  have  been  carried  considerably  to  the  east  of 
them."  —  As  the  import  of  the  phrase  "from  the  east"  (al- 
luded to  in  the  words  just  quoted,)  can  be  more  conveniently, 
as  well  as  appropriately,  considered  when  we  come  to  speak 
of  the  spot  where,  according  to  the  archaic  historian,  the 
Noachidse,  in  whole  or  in  part,  soon  after  the  flood  settled, 
—  which  is  specified  in  Genesis  11:  2,  —  we  shall  defer, 
until  that  more  fitting  occasion,  what  we  have  particularly  to 
say  respecting  it,  as  well  as  concerning  the  inference  which 
some  have  drawn  from  that  phrase,  in  regard  to  the  place 
where  the  ark  finally  rested. 

If  the  more  prominent  of  the  mental  and  emotional  exer- 
cises of  our  patriarch  and  family,  whilst  inclosed  for  a  year 
and  more  in  the  great  vessel,  could  be  given  in  detail,  it 
would,  doubtless,  present  to  us  a  superlatively  interesting  and 
instructive  history.  So  peculiar  were  their  circumstances,  — 
shut  out  so  long  from  the  world  and  its  accustomed  associa- 
tions and  employments ;  floating  in  merciful  imprisonment, 
for  more  than  a  twelvemonth,  over  the  face  of  the  eminently 
"  mighty  deep,"  —  together  with  the  incidents  and  situation  of 


EGRESS   FROM   THE   ARK.  215 

things  which  preceded  and  led  to  their  strange  and  unprece- 
dented confinement,  —  it  is  impossible  that  these  should  not 
have  been  instrumental  in  giving  birth,  in  such  minds  and 
hearts,  to  many  strikingly  novel  and  interesting  thoughts  and 
feelings.  A  lively  and  prolific  imagination  might,  peradven- 
ture,  put  some  of  these  into  form,  and  throw  them  attractively 
and  glowingly  before  our  mind's  eye ;  but  a  full  and  reliable 
history  of  them  no  being,  save  One,  could  furnish ;  and  that 
One  has  not  seen  fit  to  do  it ;  and  to  this  want,  what  we  have 
to  do  in  a  thousand  other  cases,  we  have  to  do  here  —  quietly, 
acquiescingly  submit. 

"And  it  came  to  pass  in  the  six  hundred  and  first  year,  in 
the  first  month,  the  first  day  of  the  month,  the  waters  were  dried 
up  from  off  the  earth ;  and  Noah  removed  the  covering  of 
the  ark,  and  looked,  and  behold,  the  face  of  the  ground  was 
dry.  And  in  the  second  month,  on  the  seven  and  twentieth 
day  of  the  month,  was  the  earth  dried."  And  what  then  en- 
sued ?  Lo,  the  door,  the  so  long  closed  and  sealed  door  of 
the  floating  house  is  thrown  open  ;  and  Noah  receives  from 
God  the  command,  "  Go  forth  " —  "  Go  forth  of  the  ark,  thou, 
and  thy  wife,  and  thy  sons,  and  thy  sons'  wives  with  thee. 
Bring  forth  with  thee  every  living  thing  that  is  with  thee  of 
all  flesh."  Oh,  with  what  strange  and  big  thoughts  and  emo- 
tions do  the  Noachidas  hear  the  mandate,  and  commence  and 
consummate  their  egress.  Behold  them !  What  full-laden 
and  thrice  eloquent  utterances  do  their  waked  and  glowing 
countenances,  and  swelling,  heaving  bosoms,  pour  forth! 
Yet  their  lips  speak  not ;  these  have  for  the  time  lost  the 
power  of  so  doing  ! 

How  different  a  world  from  what  our  patriarch  had  been 
for  six  hundred  years  accustomed  to  look  and  tread  upon,  is 
the  one  on  which  his  eyes  gaze  and  his  feet  fall  as  he  passes 
from  his  floating  structure.  Where  is  the  teeming  popula- 
tion with  which  he  had  previously  been  surrounded  ?  Where 
on  every  hand  the  busy  stir  of  sentient  and  animated  exis- 


21 G  LEGEND    OF   THE    SEVEN    SLEEPERS. 

tence  ?  The  very  face  of  nature,  how  altered  !  The  green 
hills,  the  waving  plains,  the  rich  foliage,  the  cheering  ver- 
dure, the  floral  beauties  and  fragrances  that  were  —  where 
are  they  ?  Suppose  you  had  laid  down  in  some  charming 
vale  where,  ere  your  senses  were  leadened  by  sleep,  your 
eye  would  be  feasted  with  beauties,  and  your  ear  with  melo- 
dies, and,  upon  waking,  found  yourselves  encompassed 
with  one  entire  scene  of  unbroken  stillness  and  utter  desola- 
tion, would  you  not  be  affected  deeply,  strangely,  by  the  con- 
trast ?  Were  our  postdiluvian  father  and  the  seven  souls 
with  him  such  different  specimens  of  humanity  as  not  to  be 
wellnigh  overcome  by  the  contrast  which  they  on  every  hand 
witnessed?  They  must  have  felt  very  much  indeed  as  if. 
their  vessel  had  landed  them  on  the  face  of  some  before 
untenanted,  unvisited  world.  They  could  recognize  abso- 
lutely nothing.  "  The  seven  sleepers "  had  occasion  to 
feel  little  surprise  in  the  comparison ;  and  to  be  at  incompar- 
ably less  loss  as  to  their  whereabouts. 

As  you  may  not  all  have  become  acquainted  with  the 
legend  to  which  we  have  referred,  it  will  not  be  amiss  to  lay 
it  before  you.  In  the  interval  which  elapsed  between  the 
reign  of  the  Emperor  Decius  and  the  death  of  Theodosius  the 
younger,  —  i.  e.,  between  the  years  249  and  450  of  our  era, — 
the  union  of  the  Roman  empire  had  been  dissolved,  and  some 
of  its  fairest  provinces  overrun  by  the  barbarians  of  the  north. 
The  seat  of  government  had  passed  from  Rome  to  Constanti- 
nople, and  the  throne  from  a  pagan  persecutor  to  a  succes- 
sion of  Christian  and  orthodox  princes.  The  genius  of  the 
empire  had  been  humbled  in  the  dust,  and  the  altars  of  Diana 
and  Hercules  were  on  the  point  of  being  transferred  to  Catho- 
lic saints  and  martyrs.  The  legend  relates  that  "  when 
Decius  was  still  persecuting  the  Christians,  seven  noble 
youths  of  Ephesus  concealed  themselves  in  a  spacious  cavern 
in  the  side  of  an  adjacent  mountain,  where  they  were  doomed 
to  perish  by  the  tyrant,  who  gave  orders  that  the  entrance 


A    STRIKING    ALLEGORY.  217 

should  be  firmly  secured  with  a  pile  of  huge  stones.  They 
immediately  fell  into  a  deep  slumber,  which  was  miraculously 
prolonged,  without  injuring  the  powers  of  life,  during  a  period 
of  one  hundred  and  eighty-seven  years.  At  the  end  of  that 
time  the  slaves  of  Adolius,  to  whom  the  inheritance  of  the 
mountain  had  descended,  removed  the  stones  to  supply  mate- 
rials for  some  rustic  edifice :  the  light  of  the  sun  darted  into 
the  cavern,  and  the  seven  sleepers  were  permitted  to  awake. 
After  a  slumber,  as  they  thought,  of  a  few  hours,  they  were 
pressed  by  the  calls  of  hunger,  and  resolved  that  Jamblichus, 
one  of  their  number,  should  secretly  return  to  the  city  to  pur- 
chase bread  for  the  use  of  his  companions.  The  youth  could 
no  longer  recognize  the  once  familiar  aspect  of  his  native 
country,  and  his  surprise  was  increased  by  the  appearance  of 
a  large  cross  triumphantly  erected  over  the  principal  gate  of 
Ephesus.  His  singular  dress  and  obsolete  language  con- 
founded the  baker,  to  whom  he  offered  an  ancient  medal  of 
Decius  as  the  current  coin  of  the  empire  ;  and  Jamblichus, 
on  the  suspicion  of  a  secret  treasure,  was  dragged  before  the 
judge.  Their  mutual  inquiries  produced  thg  amazing  dis- 
covery, that  two  centuries  were  almost  elapsed  since  Jam- 
blichus and  his  friends  had  escaped  from  the  rage  of  a  pagan 
tyrant."  (Gibbon's  Decline  and  Fall,  chap.  23.) 

As  farther  illustrating  or  setting  forth  the  changes  which  a 
series  of  years  produce,  you  will  allow  me  to  give  you  the 
following  passage  from  an  Arabian  writer,  Mohammed  Kaz- 
wini,  who  flourished  in  the  seventh  century  of  the  Hegira, 
or  at  the  close  of  the  thirteenth  century  of  our  era.  It  is 
given  as  the  narrative  of  Khidhz,  an  allegorical  personage : 
"  I  passed  one  day  by  a  very  ancient  and  wonderfully  popu- 
lous city,  and  asked  one  of  its  inhabitants  how  long  it  had 
been  founded.  '  It  is  indeed  a  mighty  city,'  replied  he  ;  *  we 
know  not  how  long  it  has  existed,  and  our  ancestors  were  on 
this  subject  as  ignorant  as  ourselves.'  Five  centuries  after- 
wards, as  I  passed  by  the  same  place,  I  could  not  perceive 


218  REMARKABLE     TRANSITION. 

the  slightest  vestige  of  the  city.  I  demanded  of  a  peasant, 
who  was  gathering  herbs  upon  its  former  site,  how  long  it  had 
been  destroyed.  *  In  sooth,  a  strange  question/  replied  he. 
'  The  ground  here  has  never  been  different  from  what  you  now 
behold  it.'  Was  there  not  of  old,  said  I,  a  splendid  city  here  ? 
*  Never,'  answered  he,  *  so  far  as  we  have  seen,  and  never 
did  our  fathers  speak  to  us  of  any  such.'  On  my  return 
there  five  hundred  years  afterwards,  I  found  the  sea  in  the 
same  place,  and  on  its  shores  were  a  party  of  fishermen,  of 
whom  I  inquired  how  long  the  land  had  been  covered  by  the 
waters.  *  Is  this  a  question,'  said  they, '  for  a  man  like  you  ? 
this  spot  has  always  been  what  it  is  now.'  I  again  returned, 
five  hundred  years  afterwards,  and  the  sea  had  disappeared  ; 
I  inquired  of  a  man  who  stood  alone  upon  the  spot,  how 
long  ago  this  change  had  taken  place,  and  he  gave  me  the 
same  answer  as  I  had  received  before.  Lastly,  on  coming 
back  again  after  an  equal  lapse  of  time,  I  found  there  a  flour- 
ishing city,  more  populous  and  more  rich  in  beautiful  build- 
ings than  the  city  I  had  seen  the  first  time ;  and  when  I  fain 
would  have  informed  myself  concerning  its  origin,  the  inhab- 
itants answered  me,  '  Its  rise  is  lost  in  remote  antiquity ; 
we  are  ignorant  how  long  it  has  existed,  and  our  fathers  were 
on  this  subject  as  ignorant  as  ourselves.' " 

Had  Kazwini  lived  in  our  day,  he  might  have  constructed 
a  story  which  would  embrace  in  it  much  shorter  intervals  for 
the  transpiring  of  astonishing  changes,  particularly  in  the 
hemisphere  which  we  inhabit.  Instead  of  centuries,  a  score 
or  two  of  years,  in  this  age  of  the  world,  are  followed  with 
scarcely  less  amazing  alterations.  But  as  to  our  patriarch, 
not  even  the  last  mentioned  interval  was  taken  to  effect  the 
still  more  wonderful  changes  which  stared  on  his  vision.  The 
interval  of  a  year  and  a  few  days  has  produced,  oh,  what 
mutations  !  and  not  in  one  or  a  few  localities  merely.  "  Old 
things  are  passed  away  ;  behold,  all  things  are  become  new  !  " 
The  world  which  he  had  been  accustomed  to  gaze  upon,  with 


THE  GRATEFUL  RETURN.  210 

its  marts,  its  busy  hum,  its  works  of  art,  its  green  meadows 
or  verdant  lawns,  its  gardens  and  fields  of  strikingly  variegated 
and  describeless  charms,  and  its  numerous,  nameless  stores 
—  where  is  it  ?  What  world  is  this  to  which  the  great  ship 
has  transported  him  —  now  spread  out  before  his  astonished 
gaze?  Oh,  father  —  second  father! — with  what  big  and 
strange  emotions  did  thy  bosom  swell !  Scarcely  when  thou 
afterward  enteredst  that  wondrous  world  of  light  and  glory, 
matchless  and  ineffable,  where  thou,  a  rapt  spirit,  now  hast 
thy  abode,  couldst  thou  have  felt  much  more  strangely !  The 
Deluge  over,  thou  hadst  to  begin  anew  thy  course ;  and,  in- 
stead of  being,  as  formerly,  a  Brother,  thou  hadst  to  turn 
Father,  of  mankind ! 

God  had  "  remembered  Noah ; "  had  sat  upon  the  flood 
of  great  waters,  and  kindly  and  carefully  preserved  him  from 
fear  of  evil  amid  their  rage  and  roar ;  and,  having  accom- 
plished his  dreadful  yet  righteous  and  just  purpose  toward 
the  infatuate  and  infuriate  throng  who  had  turned  the  old 
world  into  an  antechamber  of  or  rather  into  a  second  hell, 
had  made  a  wind  to  pass  over,  and  drive  away  or  dry  up,  the 
mighty  sea  ;  and  now  brought  his  feet  to  stand  on  an  exsic- 
cated earth,  which  had  already  commenced  mantling  herself 
in  verdant  and  floral  bloom  and  beauty.  And  shall  not  our 
now  postdiluvian  patriarch  remember  God  in  return  ?  Ah  — 
we  would  do  this  man  injustice  by  saying  or  thinking  of  him, 
that  his  Infinite  Preserver  and  Benefactor  had  been  at  any 
time  absent  from  his  mind  or  heart,  during  the  memorable 
year  and  ten  days,  of  his  strange  incarceration  in  the  provi- 
dential prison-ship !  No  sooner  after  his  feet  have  again 
pressed  the  dry  ground,  and  he  finished  superintending  the 
egress  of  the  ark's  safely  kept  tenants,  than  he  enters  upon  the 
erection  of  "  an  altar"  on  which,  " of  every  clean  beast,  and 
of  every  clean  fowl,"  to  offer  "  burnt  offerings  "  unto  the  Lord. 
(Gen.  8:  20.)  Our  English  word  altar  comes  from  one  in 
the  Latin  (altus)  which  signifies  high,  because  altars  were 


220  THE  ALTAR  AND  SACRIFICE. 

originally  made  of  high  raised  mounds  of  earth,  (Ex.  20  : 
24,)  or  built  on  the  tops  of  hills  and  mountains.  Though 
this  altar  of  Noah  is  the  first  of  which  we  find  any  mention 
in  the  Sacred  Records,  yet,  as  we  read  of  sacrificial  oblations 
before  the  flood,  even  in  the  earliest  times  before,  there  were, 
undoubtedly,  altars  found  or  made,  on  which  to  present  them 
unto  God.  As  our  patriarch,  ere  he  became  a  postdiluvian, 
was  not  ignorant  of  this  mode  of  religious  worship ;  as  he, 
without  a  peradventure,  had  himself  oft,  during  the  six  hun- 
dred years  which  he  had  passed  in  the  antediluvian  world, 
given  expression  after  this  manner  to  his  grateful  and  devo- 
tional impulses,  —  he  had  no  occasion  to  wait  for  the  issue, 
from  a  divine  source,  of  a  special  mandate  thus  to  express 
his  gratitude  to  the  "  Giver  of  all  good"  for  the  signal  mer- 
cies which  he  had  experienced ;  —  and  it  was  without  question 
doubly  pleasing  and  precious  to  the  Lord,  that  he  went  about 
it,  "  not  of  constraint,  but  willingly."  Apart  from  direct  com- 
mand, he  was  indeed  not  without  sufficient  to  move  him  to 
this  course.  Aware  of  the  thrice  awful  fate  of  the  millions 
of  his  antediluvian  contemporaries ;  of  not  only  the  simulta- 
neousness  of  his  salvation  and  their  destruction ;  but  of  the 
fact  that  the  same  waves  which  had  swept  them  from  the 
land  of  the  living  had  been  the  means  of  keeping  him  and 
his  little  household  in  it ;  —  that  the  "  eight  souls  "  had  been 
so  mercifully  and  marvellously  distinguished  as  to  be  the  sole 
survivors  of  a  heretofore  vastly  multiplied,  and,  so  recently  as 
it  were  as  yesterday,  eminently  multitudinous  race  ;  —  borne 
on  the  bosom  of  so  widely  sweeping  and  tremendously  deso- 
lating a  judgment,  unharmed  and  undismayed,  to  a  secure 
and  quiet  haven,  —  our  second  father  needed  nothing  super- 
added,  surely,  to  inspire  him  with  the  most  melting  and  moving 
impulses  ;  to  fill  his  big  soul  to  overflowing  with  emotions  of 
gratefulness,  which  he  would  naturally,  and  by  a  sort  of  moral 
necessity,  make  it  his  first  business  suitably  to  express. 
As  to  the  precise  nature  of  the  sacrifice  at  this  time 


CHARACTER    OF   THE    OBLATION.  221 

offered  by  our  postdiluvian  progenitor,  it  appears  to  have 
partaken  of  the  twofold  character  of  eucharistic  and  expia- 
tory ;  the  occasion  giving  it  the  one  attribute,  and  the  ma- 
terial the  other :  for,  under  the  law,  not  usually  of  the  bloody 
sort  were  thank-offerings.  It  somehow  strikes  us  that  herein 
is  our  highly  esteemed  second  father  to  be  regarded  as 
offering  thanks  to  the  Father  of  mercies  for  his  signal  bene- 
factions, his  thrice  memorable  favors,  in  the  believing 
recognition  and  feeling  sense,  that  all  those  mercies  and 
blessings  for  which  he  expresses  himself  thankful,  have  come 
to  him  through  Uood — have  reached  him  through  the  me- 
dium or  channel  of  that  meritorious  and  expiatory  Sacrifice  of 
which  his  bloody  "  burnt-offerings  "  were  a  type.  Through 
this  same  medium,  and  in  this  same  exercise,  he  rendered 
adoration  as  well  as  expressed  his  grateful  acknowledgments 
unto  God  ;  devoted  himself  and  household  renewedly  to  his 
service;  and 'sought  protection  and  blessing  further  for  him 
and  his,  amidst  the  desolations  which  surrounded  them,  and, 
as  we  may  believe,  on  his  posterity,  in  all  its  anticipated 
ramifications,  in  all  coming  time. 

The  oblation  of  our  pious  ancestor,  thus  presented,  we  are 
assured  was  accepted  of  God,  and  his  prayer,  we  are  left  to 
infer,  not  unavailing.  What  we  find  in  the  two  succeeding 
verses  clearly  asserts  the  one  and  implies  the  other.  "  The 
Lord  smelled  a  sweet  savor;"  —  the  sacrifice  which  our 
worthy  patriarch  offered  was  as  grateful  and  acceptable  to 
the  Lord  as  sweet  odors  are  to  a  man.  Not  that  the  smell 
of  burning  flesh  could  in  itself  be  pleasing  to  God ;  but 
as  it  prefigured  the  sacrifice  of  the  atoning  Mediator,  to  be 
offered  in  the  fulness  of  time  ;  and  as  the  oblation,  with  its 
attendant  exercises,  was  expressive  of  Noah's  sense  of  per- 
sonal unworthiness,  of  his  dependence  for  all  benefactions, 
past  and  to  come,  on  a  vicarious  basis,  and  his  grateful  love  to 
the  beneficent  and  merciful  "  Giver  of  every  good  and  per 
feet  gift." 


222      THE    SACRIFICIAL    RITE,   ITS   RISE   AND    DESIGN. 

There  is,  young  gentlemen,  an  implied  truth  underlying 
that  declaration  relative  to  the  acceptableness  to  the  Deity  of 
the  oblation  presented  by  our  patriarch  on  "  the  altar  which  he 
had  builded  :  "  It  is,  that  the  sacrificial  proceeding  was  either 
an  act  of  obedience  to  a  direct  divine  command  received  by  him, 
or  else  an  act  in  the  way  of  observance  of  a  previously  existing 
divine  institution.  But  the  Record  affords  us  no  intimation 
from  which  we  can  infer  the  former.  The  latter,  therefore,  is  to 
be  concluded  to  be  the  truth,  namely,  that  it  was  done  in  observ- 
ance of  a  divine  institution  previously  existing.  The  manner, 
moreover,  in  which  our  second  father  entered  upon  the  business 
of  offering  a  sacrifice  or  sacrifices,  shows  that  it  was  with  him 
no  novel  performance.  And  if  he  had  been  accustomed  to 
engage  in  acts  of  this  kind,  it  may  well  be  believed  that  he 
had  not  been  altogether  singular  in  this  ;  —  that  those  pious 
antediluvians  with  whom  he,  during  the  half  dozen  centu- 
ries that  he  had  lived  before  the  flood,  at  one  time  and 
another  was  acquainted,  had  been  accustomed  to  do  the  like. 
And  whence  the  custom  which  they  followed,  it  is  not  diffi- 
cult to  conceive.  Many  of  these  early  patriarchs  had  been 
born  so  far  back  toward  the  sunrise  of  time  as  to  have  en- 
joyed a  personal  acquaintance  with  righteous  Abel.  Now  it 
is  matter  of  record  that  this  son  of  our  first  parents  offered 
animal  sacrifices,  and  that  in  this  act  he  did  what  was  well- 
pleasing  to  God.  The  smoke  of  the  sacrifice  came  up  as  a 
sweet  savor  before  Jehovah.  How  so?  Did  that  Infinite 
Being  delight  in  the  smell  of  burnt  flesh  and  blood  simply  ? 
Was  it  not,  must  it  not  have  been,  because  the  sacrifice  was 
an  important  instituted  type ;  and  that  the  offerer,  in  the  act 
he  performed,  engaged  with  an  obedient  spirit  in  the  ob- 
servance of  a  divine  institution,  and  in  the  exercise  of  faith 
—  faith  relative  to  the  source  whence  it  originated,  and  in 
regard  to  what  the  sacrifice  prefigured  ?  That  there  was  an 
exercise  of  this  last  mentioned  principle  by  the  righteous  and 
accepted  offerer,  is  a  matter  concerning  which  we  have  spe- 


THE    SACRIFICIAL    RITE,   ITS   RISE   AND    DESIGN.       223 

cific  Scripture  testimony  —  as  you  may  see  by  turning  to 
Hebrew  11  :  4.  Yet,  that  Abel  offered  the  first  animal 
sacrifice  that  was  ever  presented  before  the  Lord,  when  he 
performed  this  recorded  act,  he  who  addresses  you  does  not 
believe  —  for  reasons  of  which  he  will  postpone  the  mention 
till  the  beginning  of  another  lecture. 


EVENING    SEVENTEENTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

That  Abel's  animal  oblation,  mentioned  in  Gen.  4 :  4,  was 
not  the  first  of  the  kind  ever  offered  before  the  Lord  we  do 
not  believe,  for  the  following  reasons:  —  JFirst.  He  does 
not  appear  to  have  performed  this  solemn  act  from  a  direct 
divine  command  addressed  to  him  immediately  before.  Had 
this  been  the  case,  it  seems  probable  that  there  would  have 
been  a  mention  by  the  historian  of  the. circumstance.  Second. 
He  was  a  young  man,  and  appeared  to  be  but  following  an 
example  previously  set  him.  That  his  father  before  him  had 
been  accustomed  to  offer  animal  sacrifices  we  are  almost 
forced  to  infer  from  the  fact  that  "  the  coats  of  skins,"  skins 
of  slain  animals  which  our  first  parents  wore,  were  not  the 
skins  of  animals  slain  for  food,  since  animal  food  was  not 
allowed  to  man  until  subsequent  to  the  deluge.  The  rational 
conclusion,  and  apparently  the  only  rational  one  which  can 
be  drawn,  is,  that  they  were  the  skins  of  animals  slain  for 
sacrifice.  It  is  reasonable  to  believe,  nay,  we  are  impelled 
to  the  belief,  that  as,  to  our  first  parents,  just  after  their 
guilty  fall,  the  Lord  gave  audible,  so  he  likewise  gave  visible 
intimations  of  his  mercy  ;  —  that  he  would  inspire  hope,  and 
fan  it,  by  something  addressed  to  the  eye  as  well  as  the  ear; 
and  that  therefore  he,  just  after  their  expulsion  from  the 
Garden,  introduced  an  institution  which  was  adapted  to  indi- 


THE    SACRIFICIAL   RITE,   ITS   RISE   AND    DESIGN.      225 

cate  not  only  that  should  God  be  approached  and  worshipped 
by  them,  though  fallen ;  but  also  how  he  could  be  approached 
and  worshipped  acceptably,  —  after  a  manner  so  acceptable 
as  again  to  receive,  and  have  their  hearts  kindled  into  ecstasy 
by,  his  smiles.  Here,  if  there  are  those  who  do  not,  we  look 
for  and  find  the  origin,  the  divine  origin,  of  the  sacrificial 
rite,  —  the  great  typical  institution  which  answered  so  mo- 
mentous and  merciful  a  purpose  all  the  way  down  from  the 
Fall  to  the  period,  four  thousand  years  after,  when  the  Great 
Sacrifice  which  it  foreshadowed,  and  was  given  for  the  special 
purpose  of  foreshadowing,  appeared. 

We  may  hence  see  how,  as  our  patriarch's  heart,  as  he 
and  his  household  stepped  forth  from  the  ark,  was  so  full  of 
gratitude  that  he  pantingly  hastened  to  give  expression  to  it 

—  to  pour  out  its  full  tide  at  the  feet  of  his  Infinite  Preserver 
and  Benefactor,  —  so  his   mind  was   full  of  the  institution 
which,  in  tones  somewhat  above  a  whisper,  told  how  God 
could  be  merciful  and  yet  be  just ;  —  how  He  who  infinitely 
hated  sin  could   be  approached   and  worshipped,   ay,   and 
thanked,  acceptably,  by  the  sinner. 

Apart  from,  or  in  addition  to,  what  has  been  already  said 
in  regard  to  the  divine  origin  of  the  Sacrificial  Institution, 
we  would  be  led  to  infer  it  from  its  character  and  intent,  — 
the  former  of  which  being  such  as  that  we  cannot  see  how 
unaided,  uninstructed  human  reason  should  have  originated 
or  hit  upon  such  a  rite ;  and  the  latter  such  as  that  an  idea  of 
the  sort  could  spontaneously,  or  of  its  own  accord,  hardly 
have  had  birth  in  the  human  mind. 

The  sacrificial  rite  has  in  some  phase  or  form  been  found 
prevailing  among  all  nations,  —  even  among  those  who 
have  little  or  no  knowledge  of  its  original  or  true  intent, 
and  who  are  destitute  of  a  knowledge  of  the  true  God 
even.  Whence  had  all  the  nations  of  the  globe  this  rite  ? 

—  whence  but  from  one  and  the  same    source,  —  by  tradi- 
tion  from    the   prime  Noachic  family?  —  affording  one  of 


226      THE    SACRIFICIAL   RITE,   ITS   RISE   AND    DESIGN. 

many  proofs  that  all  the  nations  and  tribes  of  men  are 
descended  from  that  one  great  postdiluvian  who,  upon 
leaving  the  ark,  hastened  to  build  an  altar  unto  the  Lord, 
and  to  offer  burnt  offerings  thereon. 

As  we  hinted  toward  the  close  of  the  preceding  Exercise, 
there  is,  in  the  two  verses  succeeding  the  record  of  the 
sacrificial  act  of  our  patriarch,  an  implied  intimation,  and 
it  is  so  clear  as  to  be  unmistakable,  that  the  supplications  of 
our  pious  progenitor,  presented  in  connection  and  simulta- 
neously with  his  animal  oblation,  were  not  unavailing. 
Examine  those  verses  and  you  will  not  fail  of  saying  so. 
As,  what  the  Lord  there  "  said  in  his  heart "  we  find  him 
afterward,  in  substance,  saying,  in  the  form  of  a  covenant, 
to  Noah,  (see  Gen.  9  :  9-17,)  we  will  reserve  whatever 
remarks  we  are  disposed  to  make  relative  to  this  point,  to 
the  time  when  the  consideration  of  that  covenant  will  come 
in  regular  course  before  us. 

If  you  will  now  cast  your  eye  on  the  commencing  verses 
of  the  ninth  chapter  of  Genesis,  you  will  have  the  topics 
suggested  to  your  mind  upon  the  consideration  of  which  we, 
in  the  order  there  presented,  are  about  to  enter.  That  we 
may  not  lose  sight  of  the  chronology,  it  may  not  be  amiss  to 
remark  that,  according  to  the  Hebrew  reckoning,  had  Adam 
been  still  alive,  he  would  have  entered  upon  his  one  thou- 
sand six  hundred  and  fifty -seventh  year.  Our  postdiluvian 
father  had  now  entered  upon  his  six  hundred  and  first  year. 
There  is  yet  therefore  more  than  one  third  of  his  Life  and 
Times  still  to  come  under  review,  —  for  he  lived,  as  we 
shall  see,  three  hundred  and  fifty  years  after  the  Flood,  and 
died,  according  to  the  Hebrew  or  Usherian  computation,  two 
years  before  the  birth  of  Abraham.  We  have  thought  it 
proper  and  expedient  to  mention  this  now,  that  we  may  not, 
through  remissness  in  regard  to  the  reckoning,  lose  sight  of 
where  we  are  on  the  sea  of  time,  or  how  much  space  we 
have  still  to  traverse. 


THE   PRECEPT   IN    GEN.    9  I    1.  227 

Lest  he  who  came  over  the  great  waters  from  the  Old 
World,  or  any  of  the  seven  who  were  companions  of  his  voy- 
age, should  infer  from  any  cause  —  such  for  instance  as,  along 
with  the  woful  apostacy  of  the  first  father  of  the  race,  the 
consequent  depravity,  and  proneness  to  do  evil  among  his 
posterity,  and  the  baleful  effect  which  had  been  witnessed, 
the  other  side  of  the  Flood,  of  the  great  augmentation  of  their 
number  —  or  from  the  character  of  the  Lord's  recent  astonish- 
ing dealings  toward  the  vast  antediluvian  population,  and  the 
extreme  paucity  of  the  number  that  had  been  preserved  from 
a  watery  grave  —  that  the  Most  High,  from  a  feeling  of  hos- 
tility toward  the  apostate  human  family,  or  from  considera- 
tions of  expediency,  would  be  averse  to  the  great  increase 
again  of  their  numbers,  the  Supreme  Sovereign  deemed  that 
there  was  occasion  for  a  reissue  of  the  command  given  to  our 
first  parents  on  the  day  of  their  creation,  to  "  be  fruitful,  and 
multiply,  and  replenish  the  earth,"  (Gen.  9:1,  compared 
with  1 :  28,)  as  well  as  for  a  reassurance  of  his  blessing  upon 
him  and  his. 

But,  in  the  way  of  the  great  and  rapid  multiplication  of 
human  beings,  and  the  replenishing  of  the  postdiluvian  earth 
with  them,  some  formidable  obstacles  lay.  The  survivors  of 
the  former  world,  what  a  feeble  handful !  and  the  sun  of  our 
second  father  and  mother  so  far  past  the  meridian,  that  no 
auxiliary  advantages  could  they  rationally  expect  to  yield  to 
their  three  sons  with  their  wives  toward  restocking  the  world 
with  inhabitants ;  and  serious  apprehensions  might  very 
naturally  be  entertained  that  in  their  inceptive  paucity  and 
weakness  they  would  be  illy  prepared  to  cope  with  the  fero- 
cious portions  of  the  animal  kingdom,  which  there  was  a 
likelihood  of  so  multiplying,  and  speedily,  as  greatly  to  im- 
peril their  safety  and  life.  To  relieve  or  preserve  the  feeble 
band  from  all  unnerving  or  tormenting  anxiety  on  that  score, 
the  Lord  informs  or  promises  Noah  and  his  sons  that  "  the 
fear  and  dread  of  them  should  be  upon  every  beast  of  the 


228  THE   DOMINION    OF    DREAD. 

earth,  and  upon  every  fowl  of  the  air,  upon  all  that  moveth 
upon  the  earth,  and  upon  all  the  fishes  of  the  sea ;  into  your 
hand,"  says  he,  "  are  they  delivered."  A  somewhat  signal 
disparity  appears  between  the  original  grant  of  dominion  over 
the  brute  creation  and  this  postdiluvian  one.  Our  first  father, 
ere  he  ate  "  the  apple,"  ruled  the  inferior  animals  by  love 
and  kindness,  as  their  gentleness  and  docility  were  palpa- 
bly their  predominant  characteristics.  Not  so  in  regard  to 
our  second  father  and  his  progeny.  The  sacrifice  of  human 
innocence  long  ere  Noah  saw  the  light,  had  been  succeeded 
by  a  sacrifice  of  the  pleasant  primeval  sway.  Henceforth, 
among  almost  all  orders  of  the  animal  tribes,  untractableness, 
ferocity,  and  enmity  to  man  were  observably  prevalent.  The 
Deity  does  not  therefore  say  to  this  little  postdiluvian  band, 
with  so  good  a  man  even  as  Noah  at  their  head,  The  love  of 
you  shall  so  control  all  the  animal  tribes  that  you  shall  have 
naught  to  fear  from  them.  In  other  words,  the  full  primitive 
grant  is  not  restored,  as  the  full  primitive  innocence  is  not. 
But  in  the  room  of  love,  another  principle  shall  operate 
powerfully  and  generally  for  man's  security,  —  the  principle 
of  fear  or  terror.  Herein  is  the  mercy  of  God  shown  to 
fallen  man,  for  He  it  is  who  has  so  constituted  the  inferior 
animals  since  mankind  became  fallen.  And  truly  the  human 
family  became  so  altered  by  the  fall,  that  it  is  scarcely  to  be 
wondered  at  that  even  the  most  fierce  and  ferocious  of  the 
sub-human  orders  of  creatures  should  stand  in  awe  of  and  run 
from  them,  as  thinking  their  distance  preferable  to  their 
presence ;  and  this  without  a  constitution  remarkably  variant 
from  the  primitive.  And  have  you  not  sometimes  had  your 
surprise  excited,  at  one  time  to  witness  animals  of  greatly 
superior  strength  to  that  of  man,  tamely  and  quietly  sub- 
mitting not  alone  to  his  control,  but  likewise  his  tyranny ; 
at  another,  not  only  those  of  great  strength,  but  also  ferocity, 
fleeing  in  utmost  trepidation  from  those  animals  in  human 
shape  whom  they  have  the  means  of  so  easily  and  quickly 


GRANT    OF    ANIMAL    FOOD. 

destroying  ?  Here  is  one  of  the  vastly  diversified  forms  in 
which  God's  mercy  is  exhibited  to  man,  which  he  should  not 
be  so  stolid  as  not  to  recognize,  nor  so  stubbornly  ungrateful 
as  not  to  feel  and  express  thankfulness  for.  In  what  we  have 
alluded  to,  the  majesty  of  man's  presence,  and  the  fact  of  his 
original  lordship,  are  by  the  brute  creation  strikingly 
acknowledged. 

To  stimulate  and  encourage  our  patriarch,  his  sons,  and 
their  progeny,  in  the  great  work  which  a  wide,  unsettled,  and 
unsubdued  world  called  upon  them  to  engage  in  and  to  prose- 
cute, the  Supreme  in  his  munificent  clemency  made  a  grant 
as  to  means  of  sustenance,  additional  to  what  had  been  made 
to  man  at  the  first ;  and  one  tending  to  mitigate  the  curse, 
"  in  the  sweat  of  thy  face  shall  thou  eat  bread," — to  mitigate 
the  severity  of  hard  and  continuous  toil.  We  allude  to  the 
item  of  animal  food:  "  Every  moving  thing  that  liveth  shall 
be  meat  for  you  ;  even  as  the  green  herb  have  I  given  you 
all  things,"  (Gen.  9 :  3.)  What  a  large,  liberal,  universal 
grant  is  here,  in  the  room  of  the  limited  one  of  which  we  find 
mention  in  Gen.  1 :  29.  It  has  been  generally  agreed  among 
writers,  that  mankind  before  the  flood,  notwithstanding  the 
lawlessness  and  flagitiousness  at  length  of  their  conduct  in 
many  or  most  other  respects,  confined  themselves  within  the 
limits  of  the  original  grant.  Hence  it  may  be  inferred  that 
from  the  fall,  when  the  curse  fell  upon  the  face  of  the  ground 
for  man's  sake,  down  through  all  the  antediluvian  period,  the 
lives  of  men  must  have  been  very  toilsome.  In  the  sweat 
of  their  face,  literally,  and  emphatically,  they  must  have 
eaten  their  bread.  Mention  was  made  in  our  first  lecture  of 
the  opinion  of  Shuckford  as  to  the  main  reason  why  Lamech 
gave  his  son  the  name  Noah.  If  animals  were  at  all  used 
for  food  prior  to  the  flood,  it  was  done  by  transcending  the 
grant  originally  made  by  the  Creator.  Explicitly  allowed 
until  now  it  indisputably  appears  not  to  have  been  ;  even  if, 
from  the  language  employed  in  Gen.  1 ;  29,  it  may  not  be 
11 


230  TVHY     THIS    GRANT. 

inferred  that  the  use  of  flesh  for  food  from  the  first  was  not 
absolutely  forbidden. 

Should  it  be  inquired  why  mankind,  after  the  flood,  had  a 
larger  grant  made  them,  as  to  articles  of  diet,  than  before,  it 
might  not  be  found  easy,  perhaps,  to  return  a  fully  satisfac- 
tory answer:  —  unless  So  the  Lord  willed,  would  fully  satistY 
the  inquirer.  In  addition  to  the  one  a  moment  ago  hinted  at, 
namely,  that  every  disheartening  obstacle  might  be  taken  out 
of  the  way  of  our  postdiluvian  progenitor  in  the  re-settling  of 
tne  world,  —  some,  whose  minds  are  prolific  of  conjectures, 
have  ventured  to  advance  the  idea,  that,  at  the  time,  and  as 
an  effect  of  the  deluge,  so  much  of  an  alteration  took  place  in 
the  vegetable  world,  as  to  render  its  productions  less  nutritive 
than  they  were  previously ;  as  well  as  such  a  change,  prob- 
ably, in  the  constitution  of  man,  as  to  render  a  grosser  and 
higher  diet  essential.  These  have  thought,  that  it  might  be 
safely  inferred,  from  the  fact  of  this  enlarged  grant,  that  the 
earth  was  less  fertile  posterior,  than  it  was  prior,  to  the  flood ; 
and  that  the  human  constitution  was  greatly  impaired  by  the 
alterations  which  had  occurred  through  the  whole  economy 
of  nature.  "  Morbid  debility,  induced  by  an  often  unfriendly 
state  of  the  atmosphere,  with  sore  and  long-continued  labor, 
would  necessarily  require  a  higher  nutriment  than  vegetables 
could  supply.  That  this  was  the  case,  appears  sufficiently 
clear  from  the  grant  of  animal  food,  which,  had  it  not  been 
indispensably  necessary,  had  not  been  made."  Such  is  the 
language  of  Dr.  Adam  Clarke.  You  may  weigh  the  opinion 
here  advanced,  and  try  to  ascertain  how  much  it  is  worth. 
Others  have  thought  —  an  idea  at  a  greater  remove  from 
being  a  favorite  with  us  than  the  preceding  —  that  God 
indulged  our  postdiluvian  ancestry  in  this,  because  of  the 
hardness  of  their  heart  —  an  opinion  not  very  complimentary 
to  Noah  and  his  sons  —  and  that,  perceiving  the  eagerness 
of  their  appetites  towards  "  carnal  food,"  and  designing  withal 
to  abbreviate  the  term  of  human  life,  he  gave  them  a  free 


THE    SPECIFIED    RESTRICTION.  231 

license  to  eat  it,  knowing  a  free  indulgence  in  it  particularly 
efficient  toward  the  bringing  about  of  that  end.  Theodoret 
has  assigned  a  reason  for  God's  extending  the  grant  to  the 
flesh  of  animals,  which  has  in  it  more  of  plausibility,  to  wit : 
"  that  the  omniscient  and  infinitely  adorable  Jehovah,  fore- 
knowing that,  in  future  ages,  men  would  idolize  his  creatures, 
would  aggravate  the  absurdity,  and  make  it  the  more  ridicu- 
lous so  to  do,  by  their  consuming  at  their  tables  what  they 
sacrificed  at  their  altars ;  since  nothing  is  more  absurd  than 
to  worship  what  we  eat."  —  In  our  view,  the  grant  was  pal- 
pably intended,  in  part,  by  a  kind  and  pitying  God,  as  a 
compensation  for  the  difficulty  and  scantiness  with  which,  in 
comparison  with  the  luxuriance  and  abundance  of  an  age  of 
innocence,  (not  to  say  of  the  whole  antediluvian  period,)  the 
earth  yielded  her  fruit,  since  the  curse  because  of  man's  sin. 
Finally,  on  this  subject,  let  us  say,  that  God,  by  granting  to 
mankind  carnivorous  propensities  and  privileges,  has  taken 
care  to  impose  a  check  on  the  otherwise  too  rapid  and  great 
increase  of  the  various  animal  species. 

The  language  of  the  grant,  "Every  moving  thing  that 
lii'eth"  though  very  general,  is  still  not  entirely  unrestrictive. 
It  is  implied  that  animals  allowed  for  food  were  to  be  killed 
for  this  purpose ;  that  such  as  died  of  themselves,  or  were 
slain  by  other  beasts,  were  excluded  from  the  grant.  Nor  is 
that  so  general  expression,  just  quoted,  to  be  so  widely  inter- 
preted as  to  leave  us  to  infer,  that  every  kind  of  living 
creature  is  proper  food  for  man.  On  the  children  of  Israel 
you  may,  by  looking  over  Leviticus,  llth  ch.,  and  Deuteron- 
omy 14th,  find  various  restrictions  imposed,  —  a  portion  of 
which,  at  leastr  are  observed  by  all  the  civilized  portions  of 
Noah's  descendants. 

The  kind  dietetic  grant,  made  to  our  postdiluvian  father, 
was  attended  with  a  specified  prohibitory  restriction,  which 
must  not  be  passed  over  in  utter  silence.  This  restriction 
related  to  the  BLOOD  of  the  animal:  "Flesh  with  the  life 


232        THE  EATING  OF  BLOOD  PROHIBITED. 

(or  soul)  thereof,  the  Hood  thereof,  shall  ye  not  eat,"  (fourth 
verse.)  —  Concerning  the  nature  of  this  prohibition,  it  may 
be  remarked,  first,  that  the  Hebrew  doctors  understood  it  to 
relate  to  a  cutting  off  any  part  of  a  living  animal,  and  eating 
it  while  the  lifeUood  was  in  it.  Of  the  seven  precepts  which 
an  old  tradition  of  the  Rabbinical  Jews  says  that  Noah  de- 
livered to  his  children,  to  be  enjoined  on  all  their  descendants, 
one,  the  last  named  of  them,  forbade  the  eating  of  any  part 
of  an  animal  still  living.  A  fierce  and  barbarous  people  is 
spoken  of  by  Maimonides,  who,  after  cutting  pieces  of  flesh 
from  a  living  animal,  devoured  it  raw,  with  blood  streaming 
from  it,  as  a  part  of  their  idolatrous  worship.  That  this 
horrid  practice  has  prevailed,  and  was  recently  kept  up, 
among  the  Abyssinians,  we  must  believe,  if  we  place  reliance 
on  the  reports  of  Mr.  Bruce  and  Mr.  Salt,  confirmed  by  the 
statements  of  a  later  traveller,  Mr.  Madden.  Mr.  Bruce's 
report  runs  thus  :  —  "  Not  long  after  our  losing  sight  of  the 
ruins  of  this  ancient  capital  of  Abyssinia,  we  overtook  three 
travellers  driving  a  cow  before  them.  They  had  black  goat- 
skins upon  their  shoulders,  and  lances  and  shields  in  their 
hands ;  in  other  respects,  they  were  but  thinly  clothed ;  they 
appeared  to  be  soldiers.  The  cow  did  not  seem  to  be  fat- 
tened for  killing,  and  it  occurred  to  us  all,  that  it  had  been 
stolen.  This,  however,  was  not  our  business,  nor  was  such 
an  occurrence  at  all  remarkable  in  a  country  so  long  engaged 
in  war.  "We  saw  that  our  attendants  attached  themselves,  in 
a  particular  manner,  to  the  three  soldiers  that  were  driving 
the  cow,  and  held  a  short  conversation  with  them.  Soon 
after,  we  arrived  at  the  hithermost  bank  of  the  river,  where 
I  thought  we  were  to  pitch  our  tent :  the  drivers  suddenly 
tripped  up  the  cow,  and  gave  the  poor  animal  a  very  rude 
fall  upon  the  ground,  which  was  but  the  beginning  of  her 
sufferings.  One  of  them  sat  across  her  neck,  holding  down 
her  head  by  the  horns,  the  other  twisted  the  halter  about  her 
fore  feet,  while  the  third,  who  had  a  knife  in  his  hand,  to  my 


THE    EATING    OF    BLOOD    PROHIBITED.  233 

great  surprise,  in  place  of  taking  her  by  the  throat,  got  astride 
of  her  before  her  hind  legs,  and  gave  her  a  very  deep  wound 
in  the  upper  part  of  the  buttock.  From  the  time  I  had  seen 
them  throw  the  beast  on  the  ground,  I  had  rejoiced,  thinking 
that  when  three  people  were  killing  a  cow,  they  must  have 
agreed  to  sell  part  of  her  to  us ;  and  I  was  much  disappointed 
upon  hearing  the  Abyssinians  say,  that  we  were  to  pass  the 
river  to  the  other  side,  and  not  encamp  where  I  intended. 
Upon  my  proposing  they  should  bargain  for  part  of  the  cow, 
my  men  answered,  what  they  had  already  learned  in  conver- 
sation, that  they  were  not  then  to  kill  her,  that  she  was  not 
wholly  theirs,  and  they  could  not  sell  her.  This  awakened 
my  curiosity ;  I  let  my  people  go  forward,  and  stayed  myself 
till  I  saw,  with  the  utmost  astonishment,  two  pieces,  thicker 
and  longer  than  our  ordinary  beef-steaks,  cut  out  of  the  higher 
part  of  the  buttock  of  the  beast :  how  it  was  done  I  cannot 
positively  say,  because,  judging  the  cow  was  to  be  killed, 
from  the  moment  I  saw  the  knife  drawn,  I  was  not  anxious 
to  view  that  catastrophe,  which  was  by  no  means  an  object  of 
curiosity.  Whatever  way  it  was  done,  it  surely  was  adroitly, 
and  the  two  pieces  were  spread  upon  the  outside  of  one  of 
their  shields.  One  of  them  still  continued  holding  the  head, 
while  the  other  two  were  busy  in  curing  the  wound.  This, 
too,  was  done  not  in  an  ordinary  manner.  The  skin,  which 
had  covered  the  flesh  which  was  taken  away,  was  left  entire, 
and  flapped  over  the  wound,  and  was  fastened  to  the  corre- 
sponding part  by  two  or  more  small  skewers  or  pins.  Whether 
they  had  put  any  thing  under  the  skin,  between  that  and  the 
wounded  flesh,  I  know  not ;  but,  at  the  river  side  where  they 
were,  they  had  prepared  a  cataplasm  of  clay,  with  which  they 
covered  the  wound ;  they  then  forced  the  animal  to  rise,  and 
drove  it  on  before  them,  to  furnish  them  with  a  fuller  meal 
when  they  should  meet  their  companions  in  the  evening." 
(Travels,  vol.  3,  p.  142.)  On  the  299th  page  of  the  same 
volume  of  Bruce,  is  the  following :  —  "  We  have  an  instance 


234  WHY   THE   PROHIBITION. 

\ 

in  the  life  of  Saul,  that  shows  the  propensity  of  the  Israelites 
to  this  crime :  Saul's  army,  after  a  battle,  flew,  that  is,  fell 
voraciously  upon  the  cattle  they  had  taken,  and  threw  them 
upon  the  ground  to  cut  off  their  flesh,  and  eat  them  raw ;  so 
that  the  army  was  defiled  by  eating  blood,  or  living  animals. 
(1  Sam.  14:  33.)  To  prevent  this,  Saul  caused  to  be  rolled 
to  htm  a  great  stone,  and  ordered  those  that  killed  their  oxen, 
to  cut  their  throats  upon  that  stone.  This  was  the  only  law- 
ful way  of  killing  animals  for  food ;  the  tying  of  the  ox,  and 
throwing  it  upon  the  ground,  were  not  permitted  as  equivalent. 
The  Israelites  did,  probably,  in  that  case,  as  the  Abyssinians 
do  at  this  day :  they  cut  a  part  of  his  throat,  so  that  blood 
might  be  seen  on  the  ground,  but  nothing  mortal  to  the  animal 
followed  from  that  wound ;  but,  after  laying  his  head  upon  a 
large  stone,  and  cutting  his  throat,  the  blood  fell  from  on  high, 
or  was  poured  on  the  ground  like  water,  and  sufficient  evi- 
dence appeared  that  the  creature  was  dead,  before  it  was 
attempted  to  eat  it.  We  have  seen  that  the  Abyssinians 
came  from  Palestine  a  very  few  years  after  this,  and  we  are 
not  to  doubt  that  they  then  carried  with  them  this,  with 
many  other  Jewish  customs,  which  they  have  continued  to 
this  day." 

Though  the  horrid  practice  of  which  Mr.  Bruce  speaks, 
may  be  regarded  as  involved  in  the  spirit  of  the  prohibition  of 
the  fourth  verse,  yet  it  has  not  been  ordinarily  considered  by 
expositors  as  its  principal  or  primary  drift.  Mr.  Selden,  in 
his  book  De  Jure,  etc.,  has  quite  a  learned  chapter  on  this 
subject  (lib.  7,  ch.  1,)  in  which  he  has  given  the  several  opin- 
ions of  the  Rabbins  about  it ;  but  whether  these  give  much 
true  information  concerning  it,  is,  to  say  the  least,  very 
questionable. 

It  appears  from  the  language  comprising  the  prohibition 
addressed  to  Noah,  that  the  use  of  blood  in  its  simple  un- 
mixed state,  as  an  article  of  diet,  was  what  was  more  direct- 
ly meant  to  be  interdicted.  Should  you  inquire  the  reason 


WHY   THE    PROHIBITION.  235 

or  reasons  for  this  prohibitory  injunction,  we  cannot  say  that 
we  would  be  able  fully  to  satisfy  you.  Some  have  endeav- 
ored to  find  physical  or  prudential  reasons,  —  such  as  that 
this  article  affords  "  a  very  crude,  almost  indigestible,"  and  so, 
"  unwholsome  aliment ; "  or,  that  it  has  "  a  tendency  to 
beget  a  cruel,  ferocious,  and  blood-thirsty  disposition "  in 
those  who  use  it.  These  words,  "  life  thereof  which  is  the 
Hood  thereof"  appear  to  hint  at  some  moral  consideration  or 
considerations,  —  appear  to  imply  the  sacredness  of  the 
thing  forbidden  to  be  used,  because  of  the  relation  it  stands 
in  to  life  —  to  life  in  some  sense,  natural  or  symbolical.  But 
our  ordinary  limits  will  not  allow  us  to  finish  what  we  have 
to  say  on  the  subject,  this  evening. 


EVENING  EIGHTEENTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

Hardly  to  be  contended  is  it,  that  the  words  "  life  thereof, 
which  is  the  blood  thereof"  were,  by  Him  who  on  this  occasion 
uttered  them,  designed  to  put  forth  a  strictly  physiological 
doctrine ;  —  to  affirm,  as  many  have  believed,  that,  in  the 
strictest  sense,  blood  is  a  vital  fluid.  For  notwithstanding 
that  the  investigations  of  the  distinguished  Dr.  John  Hunter 
seemed  to  tend  strongly  toward  the  establishing  of  it  as  a 
truth,  physiologists  have  never  yet  been  able  to  determine  or 
settle  the  point,  what  is  life,  or  in  what  it  consists.  As  the 
Bible  was  not  given  for  a  scientific  text-book,  but  speaks  of 
natural  things  very  much  according  to  the  ordinary  concep- 
tions of  men  at  the  time  when  its  various  parts  were  written 
—  we  shall  not  be  justly  chargeable  with  heresy,  if  we  should 
interpret  the  words  which  we  have  cited  as  designed  simply 
to  express  the  general  truth,  so  familiar  to  all,  that  in  the 
animal  kingdom  the  presence  and  circulation  of  the  blood  is 
essential  to  life's  existence  or  continuance ;  that  where  the 
former  is  not,  the  latter  is  not  in  general  to  be  found.  The 
moral  argument,  or  at  least  one  branch  of  it,  then,  is,  "  Life 
is  sacred ; "  blood  is  essential  to  life ;  therefore  eat  it  not. 
But  inasmuch  as  when  we  affirm,  life  is  sacred,  we  must  mean 
that  life  which  we  individually  have  no  right  or  authority  to 
take  away,  and  so  must  mean  only  human  life  —  the  validity 


THE    EATING    OF   BLOOD,  WHEREFORE   FORBIDDEN.  237 

of  this  argument  may  well  be  questioned.  We  are  then 
thrown  upon  the  symbolical  import  of  blood,  in  order  to  an 
arriving  at  the  reason,  the  great  moral  reason,  why  the  eating 
of  blood  was  prohibited  to  Noah  and  his  progeny.  And  what 
that  symbolical  import  was,  Noah  did  not  then  need  to  be 
informed,  as  the  previous  building  of  an  altar,  and  the  offering 
of  animal  sacrifices  thereon,  testify  in  his  case.  The  blood 
of  the  Great  Sacrifice  was  prefigured  by  the  blood  of  the 
animal  sacrifices.  Hence,  in  an  eminent  sense,  the  sacred- 
ness  of  the  latter.  And  that  we  are  not  arguing  wildly  or  at 
random  when  we  find  here  the  great  reason  why  the  eating  of 
blood  was  inhibited  to  mankind  after  the  deluge,  may  appear 
from  such  an  express  subsequent  declaration  as  the  following : 
"  Whatsoever  man  there  be  of  the  house  of  Israel,  or  of  the 
strangers  that  sojourn  among  you,  that  eateth  any  manner  of 
blood ;  I  will  even  set  my  face  against  that  soul  that  eateth 
blood,  and  will  cut  him  off  from  among  his  people.  For  the 
life  of  the  flesh  is  in  the  blood  ;  and  I  have  given  it  to  you 
upon  the  altar  to  make  an  atonement  for  your  souls ;  for  it  is 
the  blood  that  maketh  an  atonement  for  the  soul,"  (Levit.  17 : 
10,  11.)  The  full  force  of  this  language  cannot  be  appre- 
ciated without  bearing  in  mind  that  the  original  word  (nephesh) 
for  life,  and  soul,  is  the  same ;  so  that  in  saying  that  the  life 
of  the  flesh  is  in  the  blood,  and  that  it  is  the  blood  that  makes 
atonement  for  the  soul  (i.  e.  the  life,)  it  is  virtually  said  that 
life  goes  for  life  in  the  great  scheme  of  expiation.  We 
accordingly  find  it  prophetically  affirmed  of  Jesus  Christ,  in 
undoubted  allusion  to  this  very  language,  that  he  should 
"  pour  out  his  soul  (nephesh)  unto  death,"  (Isa.  53 :  12 ;)  that 
is,  should  shed  his  vital  blood,  give  his  life. 

The  like  inhibition  that  was  enjoined  on  Noah  and  family 

just  after  their  egress  from  the  ark,  was  incorporated  into  the 

ceremonial  code  of  the  Jews,  and   a  like  reason  is  assigned 

in  the  latter  case  as  in  the  former.     This  you  have  seen  in 

11* 


238     THE  EATING  OF  BLOOD,  WHEREFORE  FORBIDDEN. 

the  quotation  from  Lev.  17:  10,  11,  14.  But  in  the  case  of 
the  Jew?,  there  was  an  additional  reason  for  this  prohibition 
being  pressed  on  them,  to  wit,  to  help  to  separate  them  widely 
from  the  Gentiles.  Among  these  latter,  the  use  of  blood  was 
common.  They  drank  it  often  at  their  sacrifices,  and  in 
making  covenants  or  compacts.  That  blood  was  thus  drank 
by  the  heathens,  particularly  by  the  Sabians,  in  their  sacri- 
fices, is  fully  proved  by  Spencer,  (De  Leg.  pp.  377-380.) 

As  to  the  question  whether  the  precept  given  to  our  post- 
diluvian progenitors  of  abstaining  from  blood,  be  at  present 
binding  upon  Christians,  though  as  to  its  practical  bearing  we 
would  suppose  nothing  would  need  to  be  said,  yet  in  regard 
to  its  moral,  it  ought  not  to  be  passed  over  in  perfect  silence. 
Not  on  the  ceremonial  ground  to  which  we  have  alluded,  as 
separating  the  Jews  from  the  Gentiles,  but  on  a  ground  ex- 
isting apart  from  and  anterior  to  any  ceremonial  law  ;  —  for 
the  reason  that  life  is  in  the  blood,  understanding  the  term 
life  in  a  natural  and  symbolical  sense,  or  even  in  the  latter 
solely,  it  might  be  urged  that  blood  should,  by  Christians,  as  a 
separate  and  special  article  of  diet,  be  abstained  from.  This 
might  be  plead  on  the  ground  of  the  natural  sense,  for  thus  the 
reason  applies  to  mankind  under  any  and  every  dispensation  — 
does  not  change  with  changing  circumstances  or  time ;  and 
on  the  ground  of  the  symbolical  sense,  for  thus  it  shadows 
forth  the  life  or  soul  that  has  been  poured  out  unto  death  for 
us  —  for  our  sins  and  to  procure  our  release  or  exemption 
from  death  eternal.  On  the  other  hand,  it  may  be  and  has 
been  argued,  that  the  use  of  blood  as  a  type  being  done  away? 
the  Ante-type  having  come  —  the  blood  of  the  Mediator  and 
Surety  having  been  shed  —  the  reason  for  abstaining  from  its 
dietetic  use  has  ceased.  "  Lex  stat  dum  ratio  manet "  —  no 
longer.  And  though  at  the  Council  of  Jerusalem,  in  order 
that  offence  might  not  be  given  to  the  Jews,  as  well  as  to 
remove  the  Christian  converts  of  their  day,  coming  from  the 
ranks  of  Gentilism,  in  feeling  and  practice,  as  far  as  pos- 


EXACTION    FOR    BLOOD    SHEDDING.  239 

sible  from  the  feelings  and  practices  of  idolaters  around 
them,  regarding  this  matter,  the  Apostles  of  our  Lord  ad- 
vised abstinence  from  it,  (Acts  15 :  28,  29,)  yet  the  eating 
it  or  not  eating  it  is  no  part  of  our  religion  —  as  neither  of 
these  reasons  can  be  urged  why  we  should  practise  abstinence 
from  it ;  that  hence  we  are  left  at  perfect  liberty  to  choose 
our  own  course  in  regard  to  it.  As  an  item  of  history  it 
may  be  stated  that,  up  to  the  present,  the  prohibitory  precept 
given  to  Noah,  which  we  have  been  considering,  is  scrupu- 
lously obeyed  by  the  Oriental  Christians,  and  by  the  whole 
Greek  church  ;  who  appear  to  think,  so  far  as  their  knowledge 
goes,  that  as  blood  was  not  allowed  to  be  eaten  before  Christ's 
advent,  because  it  pointed  out  the  blood  that  was  to  be  shed 
for  the  sin  of  the  world  —  it  should  not,  since  Christ's  advent 
and  crucifixion,  be  eaten,  because  it  should  ever  be  considered 
as  representing  the  blood  which  has  been  shed  for  the  remission 
of  sins. 

"We  have  seen,  young  gentlemen,  what  care  the  Divine 
Being  took  to  secure  our  patriarch's  posterity  against  any  ap- 
prehended impediment  to  their  preservation  and  great  in- 
crease, from  the  ferocity  and  ravages  of  wild  beasts.  But 
an  obstable  to  their  security  and  multiplication  might  be 
apprehended  from  another  quarter.  Noah  and  his  sons  had 
witnessed  frequent  and  fearful  exhibitions  of  violence  and 
bloodshed  in  the  Old  World.  They  had  no  reason  to  sup- 
pose that  the  waters  of  the  deluge  had  so  washed  away  the 
corruption  or  sinfulness  of  man's  nature,  that  no  evil  of  a  like 
type  would  ever  again  appear.  The  Supreme  Legislator  and 
Governor  proceeds  therefore  to  the  utterance  of  what  was 
adapted  to  allay  tormenting  and  discouraging  apprehensions 
from  this  source.  To  Noah  and  his  sons,  as  personating  the 
whole  family  and  race  of  mankind,  he  declares  that  he  would 
require  the  blood  of  those  in  return,  who  should  shed  the  life- 
blood  of  others;  he  would  require  it  of  every  animal — he 
would  require  it  of  every  man  ;  at  the  hand  of  every  man's 
brother  would  he  require  the  life  of  man.  (Gen.  9  :  5.) 


240  EXACTION    FOR   BLOOD    SHEDDING. 

The  Ruler  Supreme  had  not  indeed,  in  antecedent  times, 
acted  fully  on  this  principle  ;  had  not  been  thus  rigid  or  strict 
in  his  exactions.  He  had  for  certain  reasons  proceeded  in 
his  administration  more  leniently.  The  first  murderer,  Cain, 
he  did  not  visit  at  once  with  the  full  punishment  which  was 
due  to  the  perpetrator  of  such  a  horrid  deed.  Others  of  the 
antediluvians  who,  posterior  to  this,  committed  a  like  crime, 
had  been  treated  with  similar  leniency  as  had  been  shown  to 
Cain.  This  mild  mode  of  proceeding  toward  such  perpetra- 
tors of  deeds  of  violence  and  blood  in  the  Old  World  the 
Supreme  Ruler  perhaps  had  adopted  to  convince  men  of  the 
exceeding  wickedness  of  the  human  heart  when  left  to  act 
out  what  was  in  it ;  and  to  show  to  all  future  ages  that  He 
was  disposed  to  act  with  as  much  mildness  in  the  administra- 
tion of  his  government  over  the  world  as  possible  ;  and  that 
in  adopting  the  course  which  he  did  from  immediately  sub- 
sequent to  the  Flood  downward  —  in  introducing  the  stern 
law,  and  seeing  to  have  it  adhered  to  or  acted  on,  which  he 
announced  to  Noah,  he  was  not  acting  the  part  of  a  cruel 
tyrant;  was  not  proceeding  with  undue  or  uncalled  for 
severity ;  was  just  doing  what  mercy  as  well  as  justice  de- 
manded ;  what  human  Mrelfare  absolutely  and  palpably 
required. 

In  that  language,  "  Surely  your  blood  of  your  lives  will  I 
require  :  at  the  hand  of  every  beast  will  I  require  it ;  and  at 
the  hand  of  every  man,  at  the  hand  of  every  man's  brother 
will  I  require  the  life  of  man,"  the  Divine  Sovereign  assures 
Noah  that  He  (who  was  Lord  over  all)  from  that  time  forth, 
or  during  the  lack  of  those  institutions  which  might  otherwise 
prove  a  security,  would  take  it  directly  upon  Himself  to  see 
to  the  maintenance  of  the  interests  of  justice  among  his  crea- 
tures ;  would,  in  his  righteous  providence,  exact  from  man 
and  beast  the  human  blood  which  should  by  either  be  shed  ; 
and  would  thus  prevent  that  violence  and  awful  havoc  of  life 
which  are  to  be  reckoned  among  the  prominent  means  of 


THE    STATUTORY   DEATH   PENALTY.  241 

ruining  the  Old  World,  and  which,  unless  prevented,  our 
patriarch  and  his  progeny  might  justly  fear  would  go  far 
toward  destroying  the  New. 

But  Jehovah  does  not  stop  with  the  general  assurance  to 
our  postdiluvian  ancestor  as  to  what  He  in  his  providence 
will  see,  in  this  respect,  to  having  done.  He  issues  the  fol- 
lowing command  —  so  we  call  it ;  and  seems  to  say,  It  shall 
be  incorporated  into  the  body  of  human  law,  and  stand 
forever  as  a  binding  statute :  "  WHOSO  SHEDDETH  MAN'S 

BLOOD,  BY  MAN  SHALL  HIS  BLOOD  BE  SHED."   (Gen.  9  :  6.) 

We  are  altogether  of  the  opinion  of  those  who  consider 
this  notable  declaration  as  pointing  to  the  then  coming  ex- 
istence of  human  government  and  law  ;  and  as  announcing 
and  establishing  its  sanctions  under  all  the  awfulness  and 
permanence  of  the  divine  authority.  Here,  in  our  view,  is 
a  solemn  ordinance  of  Heaven,  that  death  by  the  hand  of  the 
magistrate  shall  follow  the  commission  of  the  crime  of  murder. 
There  is,  in  that  case,  involved  here,  the  divine  institution 
and  sanction  of  the  Civil  Magistracy.  The  fifth  and 
sixth  verses  of  the  ninth  chapter  of  Genesis  set  forth  the 
following  argument  of  God  with  our  postdiluvian  progenitor 
and  his  progeny :  "  Indulge  not  fear.  Divine  Almightiness 
and  Avenging  Justice  —  these  shall  afford  you  protection. 
Am  not  I  a  universal  Lawgiver  and  Ruler  ?  In  mine  own 
overruling  providence  the  fear  of  death  shall  be  made  to 
operate  for  the  insurance  of  life.  Let  it  be  known  that  ever, 
henceforth,  he  who  taketh  away  murderously  the  life  of 
another  shall  forfeit  his  own  life.  Not  that  it  shall  be  taken 
away  by  the  hand  of  private  revenge  or  violence.  Know 
that  in  the  very  foundation  of  human  government  I  in  my 
providence  have  determined  that  there  shall  be  laid,  as  its 
corner-stone,  this  ordinance  :  Whoso  sheddeth  man's  blood,  by 
man  shall  his  blood  be  shed.  Henceforward  I  ordain  death 
by  the  hand  of  the  magistrate  to  follow  the  perpetration  of 
the  crime  of  murder."  (See  Cheever's  Punishment  by 


242  THE    STATUTORY   DEATH    PENALTY. 

Death,  p.  135.)  "Two  things,"  says  Michaelis,  in  his  Com 
mentatio  Prior  de  Pcena  Homicidii  —  "Two  things  we're 
contained  in  this  law  given  to  Noah,  namely,  the  power  to 
proceed  by  capital  punishment  against  the  homicide,  and  the 
imperative  obligation  to  use  that  power.  God  had  declared 
that  he  would  make  inquisition  for  blood,  and  he  adds  that  he 
would  do  it  by  the  instrumentality  of  men,  committing  to 
them  the  right  of  death  against  the  murderer.  It  was  thus 
that  the  divine  and  most  benignant  Legislator  bound  togeth- 
er and  strengthened  the  society  of  the  first  postdiluvian  com- 
monwealth." It  is  said  in  this  quotation,  that  the  power  or 
right  of  death  was  committed  to  men.  As  it  was  committed 
for  security,  it  was  of  course  not  committed  into  the  hands  of 
individuals  at  random.  We  are  bound  to  regard  the  lan- 
guage, "  by  man  shall  his  blood  be  shed,"  as  referring  to  the 
formal  exercise  of  justice  in  the  civil  government.  That 
learned  Huguenot,  Andrew  Rivet,  observes  of  it,  "The 
passage  is  a  rule,  by  God  himself  promulgated,  according  to 
which  the  voluntary  wicked  homicide,  the  man  who  ma- 
liciously sheds  human  blood,  shall  himself  be  deprived  of  life 
by  man,  that  is,  by  the  legitimately  constituted  magistracy." 
Munster,  as  quoted  in  Poole's  Synopsis,  says,  "  The  magis- 
tracy is  here  constituted  by  God,  and  a  sword  put  into  its 
hands.  God,  who  had  hitherto  taken  the  judgment  into  his 
own  hands  exclusively,  after  the  deluge  makes  man  a  par- 
taker of  his  authority,  and  gives  to  him  the  power  of  life  and 
death."  Vatablus  remarks,  "  Hoc  versu  homicidis  mors 
denunciatur  quomodocunque  moriantur  sive  jussu  magis- 
tratus,  sive  a  quocunque  aliunde  a  Deo  misso  carnifice  : "  "  In 
this  verse  death  is  denounced  against  murderers,  whether 
by  command  of  the  magistrate,  or  by  any  other  executioner 
commissioned  from  God."  ( Critici  Sacri,  Tom.  1,  p.  158.) 
Likewise  Calvin  :  "  Sic  autem  Deus  vindictam  minatur  ac 
denunciat  homicidis,  ut  armet  etium  gladio  magistratus  ad 
coedes  ulciscendas,  ne  impune  fundatur  sanguis  hominum : " 
"  God  thus  threatens  and  denounces  the  punishment  of  the 


THE    STATUTORY   DEATH   PENALTY.  243 

murderer,  in  order  that  the  magistracy  may  be  armed  with  a 
sword  for  the  avenging  of  murder,  lest  the  blood  of  man 
should  be  shed  with  impunity."  ( Opera,  Tom.  1,  p.  53.) 
The  Chaldee  paraphrastic  interpretation  of  the  passage  is : 
"  Whoso  sheddeth  man's  blood,  by  man,  that  is,  by  witnesses, 
with  the  sentence  of  the  judges,  shall  his  blood  be  shed." 

The  opposers  of  Capital  Punishment  have  been  very 
desirous  to  annihilate  or  evade  the  force  of  this  divine 
statute,  delivered  primarily  to  our  postdiluvian  father.  We 
do  not  wonder  at  their  anxiety  to  demolish  this  citadel,  for 
until  this  be  accomplished  the  prospect  of  general  or  final 
victory  is  not  flattering.  And  what  methods  have  been 
adopted  by  them  to  effect  this  ?  One  is  to  substitute  the 
word  whatsoever  for  whoso  or  whosoever.  Whatsoever 
sheddeth  man's  blood,  by  man  shall  its  blood  be  shed.  The 
literal  rendering  of  the  original  is,  "  Shedding  man's  blood,  by 
man  shall  his  blood  be  shed."  To  show,  however,  that  our 
common  English  version  is  the  natural  translation  of  the 
Hebrew  construction,  it  is  only  necessary  to  present  the  fact 
that  if  our  English  sentence,  " Whoso  sheddeth"  &c.,  were 
given  forth  to  be  translated  into  the  Hebrew,  the  same  con- 
struction would  be  used  as  is  used  in  the  original  text.  In 
the  Septuagint,  the  pronoun  is  distinguished  as  in  our  ver- 
sion. Michaelis  did  indeed  choose  the  word  "  whatsoever  "  in 
order  to  include  beast  as  well  as  man,  thinking  it  better  to 
accord  with  the  preceding  context ;  not  at  all  with  the  view 
of  excluding  man,  as  his  paraphrase  proves.  It  runs  thus  : 
"  Whatsoever  creature  sheddeth  human  blood,  be  it  man  or 
beast,  by  man  shall  its  blood  in  like  manner  be  shed."  The 
advocate  of  the  abolition  of  the  death  penalty  can  obtain  no 
help  from  this  quarter,  inasmuch  as  if  it  were  rendered 
ichatsoever,  it  would  comprise  man  as  well  as  beast.  But 
the  argument  attempted  to  be  drawn  from  this  source  is  ex- 
tremely absurd,  as  it  makes  God,  at  the  opening  of  the  new 
world,  and  in  relation  to  the  crime  of  murder,  to  legislate  for 


244  THE    STATUTORY   DEATH   PENALTY. 

brutes,  and  not  for  men :  If  a  beast  kill  a  man,  its  life  shall 
be  taken  away ;  but  if  a  man  murder  his  fellow-man,  this 
statute  has  naught  in  it  applicable  to  his  case  — his  blood 
must  stay  where  it  is.  Admirable  logic!  If  a  man  then 
wish  the  life  of  his  fellow  taken,  and  for  this  purpose  should 
let  forth  his  mastiff  upon  and  thus  dispatch  him,  the  poor 
mastiff  must  lose  his  life,  but  his  master  escape.  Verily  this 
is  a  hard  case  for  the  poor  animal,  and  an  easy  one  for  the 
owner,  who  is  the  cause  of  the  death  of  the  person  killed  and 
of  the  dog  which  was  only  the  instrument  of  the  master  in 
the  perpetration  of  the  murderous  deed.  For  the  court  to 
condemn  and  sentence  the  man  to  death,  say  these  humane 
expositors  of  God's  law,  would  be  but  adding  murder  to 
murder;  —  "if  the  court  please,"  let  the  mastiff  be  hung,  but 
pity  and  protect  the  master.  Let  the  court  remember  it  is 
only  whatsoever,  and  that  "  whatsoever "  relates  only  to  the 
quadruped !  If  you  belonged  to  the  court  or  jury,  would 
you  not  be  perfectly  silenced  or  annihilated  by  so  irrefragable 
or  ponderous  an  argument  ?  And  suppose  Noah  had  under- 
stood the  statute  to  be,  "  whatsoever  sheddeth  man's  blood, 
by  man  shall  that  beast's  blood  be  shed,"  would  he  have  felt 
himself  and  posterity  to  be  by  such  statute  protected  from 
violence,  secured  from  hazardous  assault,  from  every  quarter 
from  which  harm  could  be  reasonably  apprehended  to  come 
to  him  or  them  ? 

Another  mode  in  which  the  opponents  of  capital  punish- 
ment attempt  to  ignore  or  evade  the  force  of  this  statute,  is 
by  maintaining  the  language,  "  Whoso  sheddeth,"  &c.,  to  be 
of  the  character,  not  of  a  law  or  command,  but  of  a  prediction  : 
intimating  that  the  murderer  will  usually  die  some  violent 
death.  Now,  as  to  this,  it  may  be  remarked,  First,  That 
such  an  interpretation,  even  if  admitted  to  be  correct,  would 
not  vastly  help  their  case ;  for  such  a  consequence  would  then 
follow  the  commission  of  murder  only  as  the  result  of  the 
ordering  of  Divine  Providence,  and  the  course  of  Providence 


THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY.         245 

is  but  another  name  for  the  expression  of  the  will  of  God. 
Again :  If  the  Omniscient  and  Omnipotent  Ruler  over  all 
has  here  predicted  that  capital  punishment  shall  prevail, 
opponents  may  as  well  give  up  their  opposition  to  it,  since 
opposition,  however  strenuous,  will  in  such  case  prove  un- 
availing. Let  them  not  imagine  that  they  can  prevent  the 
fulfilment  of  a  divine  prediction.  Is  it  not  even  presumptu- 
ously irreligious  to  make  such  an  attempt  ?  But  once  more : 
We  might  with  as  much  reason,  and  indeed  for  the  same  rea- 
son, interpret  the  various  parts  of  the  Decalogue  as  mere 
predictions,  for  the  same  form  of  language  is  there  used.  As 
the  Hebrew  imperative  has  no  third  person,  the  future  in 
such  instance  supplies  the  form  of  the  imperative  —  is  always 
used  indeed  in  its  stead. 

It  is  likewise  sometimes  argued  by  opponents  of  the  death 
penalty,  that  the  statute  given  to  our  postdiluvian  ancestor  is 
simply  a  permission  —  not  an  injunction.  But  it  seems  to 
follow,  according  to  this  construction,  that  God  gives  to  any 
and  every  man  the  permission  to  kill  the  murderer.  This 
will  not  do.  It  is  not  consentaneous  with  what  the  Sacred 
"Word  teaches  in  relation  to  private  revenge  :  "  Avenge  not 
yourselves,"  &c.  And  yet  this  constructive  argument  compels 
our  opponents  to  the  assumption  that  God  here  authorizes 
any  and  every  individual  to  take  into  his  own  hands  the 
avenging  of  the  crime  of  murder  by  the  death  of  the  mur- 
derer. This  inconsistency  is  to  be  in  no  way  avoided  but  by 
the  interpretation  of  the  statute  as  belonging  not  to  private 
individuals,  but  to  the  'magistracy.  But  if  it  be  permissive 
to  governments,  then,  on  the  concession  of  those  objective 
reasoners,  we  have  a  complete  divine  sanction  for  this  death 
penalty,  if  any  government  deem  it  expedient.  Wrong  then 
it  cannot  be  for  human  governments  to  inflict  it  on  the  shed- 
ders  of  human  blood. 

The  opponents  of  capital  punishment  resort  to  another 
shift.  Admitting  it  to  be  a  command  or  statute,  say  they,  still 


246         THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY. 

it  is  one  of  those  old  institutions  that  were  not  designed  to  be 
perpetual ;  one  of  those  ancient  legal  directions  given  to  a 
particular  people  and  which  were  intended  to  exist  or  be  of 
force  only  for  a  particular  time  —  enactments  that  are  done 
away  by  the  introduction  of  the  gospel  dispensation.  Replied 
to  this  it  may  and  should  be,  that  if  it  were  a  peculiarly 
Jewish  institution  or  ordinance  —  if  it  were  of  the  character 
of  the  precepts  of  the  ceremonial  law  merely,  this  might  with 
more  semblance  of  plausibility  be  plead.  But  how  can  such 
ground  be  taken  with  propriety?  Look  at  the  persons  to 
whom,  and  the  time  and  circumstances  in  which,  this  precept 
was  delivered.  It  had  its  origin  some  centuries  ere  the 
Jews,  as  such,  had  an  existence.  It  was  given  to  the  then 
whole  human  race ;  for  the  "  eight  souls  "  were  all  of  human 
kind  at  that  period  in  being.  It  was  addressed  to  our  post- 
diluvian progenitors  as  the  progenitors  of  all  mankind  who 
should  thereafter  set  foot  on  the  earth ;  was  designed  (how 
can  it  be  doubted  ?)  as  a  law  for  their  descendants  of  every 
generation  and  locality,  as  well  as  for  themselves  and 
their  proximate  progeny.  Having  been  given  long  anterior 
to  the  peculiarly  Mosaic  or  Jewish  institutions,  it  is  not  de- 
pendent on  them,  "  derives  from  them  no  part  of  its  authority, 
permanence,  or  sacredness,  but  would  be  just  as  perfect,  clear, 
and  authoritative,  if  they  were  all  swept  from  existence.  It  is 
an  ordinance  as  extensive  and  comprehensive  as  is  the  promise 
that  while  the  earth  continued,  heat  and  cold,  day  and  night, 
summer  and  winter,  seed-time  and  harvest,  should  not  fail. 
It  is  an  ordinance  just  as  universal  for  all  mankind,  as  the 
permission  to  eat  animal  food ;  no  more  to  be  restricted  to  a 
particular  people,  or  considered  as  connected  with  the  after 
application  of  the  Levitical  law,  than  the  declaration  that 
the  dread  of  man  should  be  upon  the  beasts  of  the  forest  is 
to  be  considered  as  a  promise  made  only  to  the  Hebrews ;  no 
more  than  the  declaration  that  the  blood  of  man  shall  be 
required  of  every  beast  is  to  be  considered  as  applying  only 


THE    STATUTORY   DEATH   PENALTY".  247 

to  particular  races  of  animals,  or  to  animals  occupying  a 
particular  portion  of  the  earth,  the  land  of  Canaan  for 
example.  The  ordinance  is  just  as  universal  and  compre- 
hensive, as  were  to  be  the  posterity  of  Noah ;  it  was  given 
to  him  for  all  his  sons,  and  all  their  races.  It  is  neither 
Jewish,  nor  Gentile,  nor  Christian  ;  neither  belonging  to  one 
dispensation  nor  another ;  but  it  is  an  ordinance  of  humanity 
and  of  civil  society,  the  world  over."  (Oheever.) 

Should  you  hear  men  pleading  against  this  law,  that  it  was 
adapted  to  the  necessities  of  a  barbarous  age  or  people,  but 
that  a  necessity  for  it  does  not  exist  in  our  day,  and  among 
a  civilized  and  cultivated  people,  you  would  be  disposed  to 
say  in  reply,  Were  they  to  whom  this  statute  was  primarily 
given  barbarians  ?  "Was  it  not,  on  the  contrary,  given  forth 
while  there  was  a  greater  proportion  of  both  wisdom  and 
goodness  in  the  world  than  there  has  ever  been  since  ?  Those 
whom  the  Almighty  had  so  carefully  preserved  from  the 
flood's  destroying  sweep,  were  not  a  band  of  barbarians,  as 
we  have  had  occasion  to  know.  And  when  there  was  a 
reenactment  or  repromulgation,  centuries  afterward,  it  was 
not  the  least  wise,  least  refined,  and  least  religious  people 
which  this  globe  had  on  its  surface,  among  whom  this  took 
place. 


EVENING    NINETEENTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN  : 

That  Divine  Legislator  who  primarily  enacted  the  law, 
"Whoso  sheddeth  man's  blood,  by  man  shall  his  blood  be 
shed,"  alone  has  the  right  primarily  to  revoke  or  abrogate  it. 
And  has  he  done  so  ?  Has  he  found  any  civil  community,  in 
any  age,  so  humane,  cultivated,  and  refined,  as  not  to  need  the 
punitive,  restraining,  preventive  influence  of  this  statute,  and 
so  has  repealed  it  —  rendered  it  null  and  void,  as  to  them  ? 
If  so,  let  the  age,  or  the  community,  be  pointed  out.  When, 
where,  has  the  Supreme  Legislator  and  Ruler  revoked  this 
statute  ?  Hark !  From  a  certain  quarter,  —  not  within  this 
room,  young  gentlemen,  do  we  mean — from  any  of  you  we 
could  not  expect  to  hear  it,  —  from  opponents  of  Capital 
Punishment  a  voice  comes,  saying,  God  by  his  Son  repeal- 
ed it.  The  clement,  kind-hearted  Saviour  enjoined  on  men 
the  fostering  entertainment,  and  ready,  cordial  exercise  of 
benignity  and  love;  interdicted  the  indulgence  of  a  bitter 
and  vindictive  spirit  —  a  spirit  of  revengeful  or  malicious 
retaliation.  "Ye  have  heard,"  says  that  Saviour,  "that  it 
hath  been  said,  An  eye  for  an  eye,  and  a  tooth  for  a  tooth : 
But  I  say  unto  you,  that  ye  resist  not  evil ;  but  whosoever 
shall  smite  thee  on  thy  right  cheek,  turn  to  him  the  other 
also."  —  "Ye  have  heard,"  says  he  again,  "that  it  hath  been 
said,  Thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbor,  and  hate  thine  enemy : 


THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY.         249 

But  I  say  unto  you,  Love  your  enemies,"  &c.  And  his 
apostles,  catching  his  spirit,  and  instructed  by  his  words  and 
example,  said,  "  Recompense  to  no  man  evil  for  evil ;  Thou 
shalt  love  thy  neighbor  as  thyself;  and  love  worketh  no  ill  to 
his  neighbor."  We  trust  you  love  these  instructions,  and  the 
spirit  which  both  they  breathe  and  enjoin.  They  forbid  the 
indulgence  of  a  malignant  spirit  or  temper ;  they  inhibit  pri- 
vate retaliation  and  revenge ;  they  enjoin  mutual  love.  Such 
precepts,  and  prohibitions,  and  instructions,  Christ  and  his 
apostles  saw  that  even  the  better  portion  of  mankind  —  for 
such  were  the  Jews,  until  Christianity  began  to  have  a 
prevalence  —  needed.  If  the  interpretations  referred  to 
should  be  so  interpreted,  as  to  be  understood  to  amount  to 
a  virtual  abrogation  of  the  Noachic  statute ;  as  forbidding,  in 
other  words,  capital  punishment ;  then,  their  prohibitory 
intention  and  injunction  do  not  stop  there,  but  they  inhibit 
every  kind  and  degree  of  punishment  for  any  and  every 
crime.  They  abrogate  or  annihilate  the  whole  penal  code 
of  every  people.  Such  an  interpretation  would  lead  to  the 
nullification  of  all  law,  —  for  what  are  laws  without  penal 
sanctions?  They  cease  to  be  aught  above  or  beyond 
counsels.  Nay,  more :  All  government  is  annihilated ;  — 
universal  anarchy  reigns.  Violence  and  bloodshed,  as  well 
as  other  species  of  evil,  surpassing,  if  possible,  what  was  to 
be  witnessed  in  antediluvian  times,  would  prevail,  until  no 
phase  or  vestige  of  order  not  only,  but  of  human  existence 
[.  even,  would  remain. 

We  have  searched  the  New  Testament,  and  can  find  no- 
where any  revocation  or  repeal  of  the  statute  God  gave  to 
our  postdiluvian  ancestry.  None  of  Christ's  precepts  or 
teachings  appear  to  us  to  look  that  way.  "  I  came  not,"  said 
he,  "  to  destroy  the  law."  We  find  him  repealing  no  law ; 
not  even  the  ritual  law,  which  its  very  nature  evinces  the 
Divine  Lawgiver  to  have  intended  to  endure  only  for  a  time. 
Lex  stat,  dum  ratio  manet ;  —  the  law  typical  had  accom- 


250         THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY. 

plished  its  end  when  the  great  Ante-type  appeared,  when  the 
Great  Sacrifice  was  offered ;  and  then  expired,  not  by  formal 
abrogation,  but  by  its  own  limitation.  As  to  any  great  moral 
or  civil  rule  of  God's  enactment,  our  Saviour  interfered  not 
with  it.  One  of  the  two  thieves  who  were  crucified  with 
Christ,  though  so  instructed  as  to  understand  somewhat  con- 
cerning Christ's  kingdom,  and  the  way  of  becoming  a  subject 
of  it*  did  not  know  of  any  repeal  by  Christ  of  the  law  relating 
to  murder ;  and  they,  doubtless,  in  their  robberies,  had  more 
than  once  committed  the  crime.  His  language  to  the  other 
was  :  "And  we  indeed  justly ;  for  we  receive  but  the  due  re- 
ward of  our  deeds"  The  Saviour,  who  heard  this,  did  not 
contradict  him ;  did  not  say,  I  have  repealed  that  severe  law 
given  to  Noah,  as  contrary  to  the  genius  or  spirit  of  the  dis- 
pensation I  am  introducing.  So  far  from  anything  of  this 
kind  falling  from  his  lips,  he  tacitly  admits  the  correctness  of 
what  the  malefactor  had  uttered,  and  so  the  justice  of  the 
doom  of  the  two  malefactors.  Paul,  who  at  the  time  may  be 
reasonably  supposed  to  have  a  more  thorough  understanding 
than  the  penitent  thief  had  of  Christ's  teachings,  and  of  the 
spirit  and  character  of  the  new  dispensation,  said,  when 
standing  before  Festus  under  an  accusation  from  the  Jews, 
"If  I  be  an  offender,  or  have  committed  anything  worthy  of 
death,  I  refuse  not  to  die,"  (Acts  25:  11.)  The  inference 
which  we  are  compelled  to  draw  from  this,  is  too  plain  and 
obvious  to  need  statement.  It  ought  to  make^the  opposer  of 
Capital  Punishment,  on  the  ground  just  alluded  to,  squirm 
not  a  little.  Hear  Paul  again,  when  he  is  writing  a  grave 
epistle,  and  his  mind  and  hand  are  guided  by  the  spirit  of  in- 
spiration. Turn  to  Romans  13:  1-4.  Inspect  it;  it  need 
not  be  recited ;  but  we  do  choose  to  recite  what  is,  in  our 
view,  so  correctly  and  well  expressed  by  Dr.  G.  B.  Cheever 
upon  it.  "In  this  passage,"  says  he,  "several  things  are 
brought  into  view.  First,  The  divine  appointment  of  human 
government.  Second,  A  distinct  and  explicit  recognition  of 


THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY.         251 

the  penalty  of  death  for  crime  as  then  in  existence,  and  of  the 
righteousness  of  this  custom.  Third,  A  recognition  of  it  not 
as  the  result  of  any  compact  in  society,  by  which  individual 
rights  are  committed  to  the  government,  but  as  coming  di- 
rectly from  the  appointment  and  authority  of  God.  Fourth, 
A  recognition  of  penal  inflictions  as  a  matter  of  pure  retribu- 
tive justice,  and  not  of  mere  expediency."  —  What  important 
as  well  as  clearly  legitimate  deductions  are  these.  Here 
then,  under  the  Christian  dispensation,  is  to  be  found  an 
inspired  apostle  of  our  Lord  sanctioning  capital  punishment, 
and  referring  it  to  the  ordinance  of  God  ;  it  is  the  use  of  the 
sword  in  the  punishment  of  crime  by  magistrates  as  the 
ministers  of  God.  Can  there  be  any  other  plausible  or  pos- 
sible view  taken  of  this  passage?  An 'illustrious  place,  it  is 
called  by  an  illustrious  commentator,  to  prove  the  divine  au- 
thority of  capital  punishment ;  and  he  adds  :  —  "  Contendant 
igitur  cum  Deo,  qui  sanguinem  nocentium  hominum  effundi 
nefas  esse  putant."  "They  contend,  therefore,  with  God, 
who  deem  it  to  be  wrong  to  shed  the  blood  of  guilty  men." 
( Calvini  in  Pauli  JEpistolas  Commentarii,  vol.  1,  p.  174.) 

Compare  what  is  said  by  Paul  in  the  three  concluding  verses 
of  Romans  12th  chapter,  with  the  four  initial  verses  of  the 
13th  chapter,  to  which  we  have  just  been  referring  you ;  note 
their  juxtaposition  and  relation,  and  then  tell  me,  can  it,  in 
the  face  of  this  examination  and  comparison,  be  with  any 
plausibility  plead  that  the  duty  of  private  forgiveness  inter- 
feres at  all  with  the  course  of  public  justice  in  the  infliction 
of  capital  punishment  for  the  crime  of  intentional  murder  ? 
The  conclusion  appears  to  me  irresistible,  unless  logic  has 
run  stark  mad,  that  the  postdiluvian  death  penalty  and  the 
mild  spirit  of  the  Christian  dispensation,  instead  of  being 
incompatible,  are  entirely  consistent. 

Let  those  who  imagine  that  Jesus  Christ  accounted  the 
penalty  of  death  for  intentional  homicide  too  severe  to  har- 
monize with  or  have  a  continued  existence  under  the  mild 


252         THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY. 

and  benign  dispensation  which  he  came  to  usher  in,  just  cast 
their  eye  —  if  they  will  condescend  to  do  such  a  thing  —  on 
Mat.  26 :  52,  where  our  Saviour  says  to  Peter,  "  Put  up 
again  thy  sword  in  its  place ;  for  all  they  that  take  the  sword 
shall  perish  with  the  sword."  Whilst  in  the  first  part  of  this 
verse  there  is  an  inhibition  of  private  avenging  of  injury,  we 
mistake  much  if  in  the  latter  part  there  is  not  both  an  im- 
plied supposition  of  the  existence  of  the  death  penalty,  and  a 
sanction  of  it.  There  is,  in  our  view,  a  manifest  reference 
here  to  the  old  and  well-known  Noachic  ordinance,  which  had 
come  to  be  not  only  a  fundamental  law,  but  a  fundamental 
proverb  of  society.  Let  them  look  also  —  it  is  hoped  they 
will  excuse  us  for  imposing  such  a  task  upon  them  —  at 
Rev.  13 :  10,  middle  clause,  where  there  is  a  declaration  of 
the  same  nature  with  the  preceding.  In  this  last  assertion, 
as  in  the  former,  there  is  an  obvious  appeal  to  the  authority 
of  a  known  divine  sanction,  and  to  a  proverbial  sanction 
which  has  grown  out  of  the  divine.  There  is  nothing  which 
looks  like  or  toward  an  annihilation  of  the  Noachic  statute 
with  its  penalty ;  but,  on  the  contrary,  a  prima  facie  repro- 
mulgation  of  it  by  the  great  New  Testament  teacher. 

At  the  time  the  Divine  Being  gave  the  ordinance  to  our 
postdiluvian  ancestry,  he  gave  also  the  reason  for  it :  "  For 
in  the  image  of  God  made  he  man."  The  image  here  spoken 
of  is  understood  by  many  to  indicate  the  authority  with  which 
human  magistracy  is  invested  for  the  punishment  of  crime. 
The  magistrate  resembles  as  well  as  represents  the  infinite 
Judge  and  Ruler  in  this  respect.  It  is  however  more  com- 
monly understood  to  indicate  that  resemblance  to  himself  with 
which  the  Creator  invested  the  human  creature  at  the  first, 
and  which,  since  the  fall,  if  in  a  moral  yet  not  in  every  other 
respect,  as  reason,  conscience,  and  immortality  for  instance,  is 
not  obliterated.  Interpreted  either  way,  the  reason  assigned 
remains  and  ever  will ;  is  not  limited  to  any  country,  any 
age  or  generation/  According  then  to  that  maxim  which  has 


THE    STATUTORY    DEATH    PENALTY.  253 

been  before  quoted,  viz.  :  "  Lex  stat,  dum  ratio  manet,"  the 
law  stands,  while  the  reason  continues,  this  same  statute  is, 
and  always  will  be,  everywhere  binding. 

The  further  prosecution  of  this  subject  would  be  deemed  by 
us  superfluous,  were  it  not  that  the  law  forbidding  murder 
upon  pain  of  death,  is  so  much  and  by  so  many  maligned  in 
our  day  ;  and  were  not  so  wide  as  well  as  strenuous  efforts 
put  forth  to  procure  its  erasure  from  our  statute-books.  Such 
erasure  has  indeed  in  some  instances  already  been  effected. 
If  the  experiment  be  not  followed  by  such  results  as  sooner 
or  later  to  induce  and  impel  its  restoration,  we  confess  we 
shall  be  not  a  little  disappointed.  We  despair  of  seeing  man 
become  a  more  wise  or  even  a  more  clement  legislator  than 
God  ;  and  any  legislative  body  that  either  aboilshes  or  at- 
tempts to  abolish  this  penal  statute,  in  our  view  transcends 
its  proper  sphere  ;  legislates  against  the  divine  legislation.  It 
will  be  to  us  a  mournful  thing,  to  witness  any  increased  or 
extended  legislation  of  this  character.  A  restoration  of  the 
divine  penal  statute,  in  cases  where  it  has  already  been  erased 
or  abrogated,  would  present  to  us  a  sight  much  more 
pleasing. 

There  are  those  who,  should  they  hear  or  read  what  we 
have  already  advanced,  would  no  doubt  charge  our  advocacy 
of  the  death  penalty  to  a  malign  spirit  ;  or  else  ourselves  as 
having  been  guilty  of  remissness  in  not  coming  into  the  world 
in  some  former  and  less  enlightened  age.  That  this  is  an  age 
of  "  progress,"  a  man  would  indeed  have  poor  sight  not  to  be 
able  to  see.  The  character  of  much  of  the  progress  delights 
us  exceedingly;  whilst  some  of  it,  such  is  our  blindness, 
strikes  our  feeble  and  obscure  vision  as  being  in  the  wrong 
direction.  There  is,  in  such  an  improved  and  advancing 
period  as  the  present,  some  little  danger  of  becoming  "  wise 
above  what  is  written."  We  are  willing  to  move  no  faster 
or  farther  than  is  practicable  and  yet  keep  within  the  limits 
of  the  "  record." 


254         THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY. 

That  not  yet  indeed  formidable  but  increasing  band,  "  the 
non-resistants,"  strenuously  resist  this  ordinance  of  God  ;  level 
their  heaviest  artillery  against  it,  with  a  view  to  its  summary 
and  universal  dispatch.  The  occupants  of  the  frozen,  arctic 
regions  of  skepticism,  and  of  the  frigid  Districts  adjacent,  are 
warm  in  their 'opposition  to  what  they  choose  to  denominate 
the  murderous  statute.  False  philanthropy  and  sickly  sen- 
timentalism  overflow  with  sympathy  for  those  whose  hearts 
are  steeped  and  hands  dyed  in  blood ;  are  actually  irrigating 
with  their  tears  the  fields,  already  saturated  with  human  gore, 
which  are  occupied  by  homicides ;  —  but  have  little  or  no  sym- 
pathy for  those  whose  glowing  sympathies  have,  along  with 
their  lifeblood,  been  let  out  by  the  cold  and  cruel  murderer's 
blade  ;  yes,  and  have  few  or  no  tears  for  those  whose  faces 
are  suffused  with  tears,  and  hearts  wrung  with  grief,  over 
murdered  friends  and  kindred.  Ah,  if  all  they  who  evince 
such  deep  anxiety  for  the  protection  of  the  life  of  assassins 
and  murderers,  would  cherish  more  anxiety  and  expend  more 
effort  to  throw  the  shield  of  philanthropic  protection  over 
endangered  society,  and  advocate  and  uphold  the  statute,  in 
all  its  force  and  sternness,  which,  when  it  is  universally  advo- 
cated or  sustained,  exerts  so  potent  an  influence  in  preserv- 
ing untold  numbers  from  becoming  murderers,  they  would  in 
our  opinion,  take  a  much  more  palpable  and  ready  way  of 
showing  themselves  genuine  philanthropists.  If  life  be  so 
valuable  that,  according  to  the  view  of  some  there  should  in 
the  murderer's  case  be  no  statutory  penalty  to  threaten  its 
extinction ;  it  is,  in  the  view  of  others,  of  so  much  higher 
value,  that  the  most  effective  means  possible  should  be  up- 
held and  befriended,  should  be  caused  to  exist  and  operate, 
for  the  protection  of  the  masses  of  every  community  from 
the  assaults  of  the  murderous  weapon.  God  has  exhibited 
his  high  estimate  of  human  life  in  that  Noachic  statute  which 
we  are  so  unwilling  to  see  by  human  legislation  annihilated ; 
and  naught  is  known  by  us  so  eloquent  and  efficient  to 


THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY.         255 

create  and  keep  up  in  the  entire  mind  and  heart  of  any  com- 
munity a  deep  and  perpetually  as  well  as  powerfully  influen- 
tial impression  of  life's  inestimable  value,  as  this  divine 
statutory  enactment.  Abolish  this  ordinance  and  you  abolish 
what  God  in  the  issuing  of  it  has  said,  and  men  in  every 
judicious  and  practicable  mode  should  say,  is,  than  any  and 
every  mere  human  device,  a  more  effectual  and  general  pre- 
servative of  human  life  from  the  promptings  and  pantings  of 
greedy  cupidity,  and  of  infuriate  malevolence  and  violence, 
for  its  effusion.  That  French  writer  showed  himself  not 
stolid,  who,  on  being  asked  to  lend  his  aid  to  the  abolition  of 
the  death  penalty,  replied,  "  With  all  my  heart ;  only  let  the 
messieurs,  the  assassins,  begin  the  reform  by  abstaining  from 
murder." 

Such  is  the  enormity  of  the  crime  of  murder,  as  to  leave 
at  an  unapproachable  distance  all  other  crimes  perpetrated 
by  mortals  against  their  fellows ;  and  the  Supreme  Legisla- 
tor, in  his  wisdom  and  love,  has  fixed  upon  an  appropriate 
retribution.  It  is  fitting  that  a  crime  of  such  surpassing 
magnitude,  should  be  so  distinguished  in  the  rules  and  pro- 
ceedings of  human  jurisprudence  as  to  be  visited  with  the 
extremest  penal  infliction  known  this  side  of  the  great  white 
Throne.  The  penalty  should  be  in  kind  and  degree  so  ter- 
rific, should  so  puissantly  address  itself  to  the  principle  of 
fear  in  man,  as  to  surmount,  stifle,  subdue,  every  motive  or 
impulse  to  the  perpetration  of  a  deed  of  such  superlative 
atrocity.  Its  voice  should  be  so  loud  and  strong  as  to 
drown  the  voice  of  every  passion,  urging  to  the  com- 
mission of  the  deed  of  blood.  What  numbers,  by  the 
warnings  and  appeals  of  an  existing  death  penalty,  are  an- 
nually restrained  and  preserved  from  becoming  homicides, 
God  only  knows ;  far  more,  doubtless,  than  .has  ever  entered 
the  conceptions  of  the  multitude.  And  what  numbers,  on 
the  other  hand,  are  by  this  means  annually  preserved  from 
violent  death, —  how  many  hearts  are  thus  yearly  kept  from 


256         THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY. 

being  penetrated  by  the  leaden  missile  or  the  sharp-pointed 
steel,  is  probably  not  only  unconceived,  but  wellnigh  incon- 
ceivable. The  prince  of  darkness  could  have  never  been 
justly  denominated  "  a  liar,"  much  less  "the  father  of  lies," 
had  naught  ever  proceeded  from  his  burning  lips  more 
untrue  than  that  saying  of  his,  recorded  in  the  book  of  Job  : 
"All  that  a  man  hath  will  he  give  for  his  life."  So  con- 
stituted is  man  as  a  creature,  and  such  moreover  is  he  as  a 
guilty  creature,  that  more  than  every  other  evil  which  is 
felt  or  feared  this  side  of  eternity's  domains,  he  fears  death. 
This  sentiment,  we  are  aware,  does  not  meet  with  universal 
assent,  at  least  verbal ;  but  the  number,  comparatively,  is  as 
yet  not  great,  who  are  willing  to  subject  their  reputation  for 
intellectual  and  moral  sanity  to  suspicion,  by  the  promulga- 
tion of  an  opposite  tenet. 

Some,  who,  like  their  great — prototype,  we  would  say 
were  we  not  so  reluctant  to  speak  reproachfully  of  any  — 
antecedent,  let  us  in  preference  say  —  are  inclined  to  cite 
Scripture  when,  and  only  when,  it  is  conceived  to  suit  a 
favorite  purpose,  —  may  be  heard  quoting  that  heavenly 
precept,  (Ex.  20:  13,)  "Thou  shalt  not  kill;"  protrude 
it  as  an  argument  against  the  taking  away  of  human  life 
on  any  account,  after  any  manner ;  —  strangely  forgetting, 
or  appearing  to  forget,  both  that  it  stands  in  the  very  neigh- 
borhood of  precepts  which  on  some  accounts,  and  after 
certain  methods,  order  it  (see  Ex.  21  :  12,  15,  16,  17,  22)  ; 
and  that  this  great  moral  precept  was  designed  to  pro- 
hibit and  prevent  the  murderous  occupation  of  killing  from 
being  followed.  It  surely  does  not  need  any  great  sagacity 
to  discover  that  it  is  the  crime  of  murder,  and  "  whatsoever 
tendeth  thereunto,"  against  which  that  interdict  is  aimed : 
not  to  prohibit  the  divinely  constituted  magistracy  from  exe- 
cuting the  duties  of  their  office ;  nor  to  interfere  in  the  least 
with  their  legitimate  and  appropriate  functions.  "  The  com- 
mand, Thou  shalt  not  kill,"  observes  Grotius,  "does  not 


THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY.        257 

disprove  the  right  and  duty  of  capital  punishment  inflicted 
on  criminals."  It  might  be  added,  Neither  does  it  disprove 
the  lawfulness  of  all  defensive  war ;  nor  in  every  case,  or 
under  all  circumstances,  the  right  of  self-defence. 

In  the  statute  to  which  our  attention  is  directed,  is  the 
penalty  really  too  severe  ?  In  other  words,  does  it  transcend 
the  bounds  of  justice  ?  The  source  whence  it  came  affords 
sufficient  proof  that  it  does  not ;  for  though  the  act  of  God  in 
affixing  such  a  penalty  to  the  crime  contemplated,  does  not  of 
itself  make  it  just ;  yet  such  is  the  rectitude  of  his  nature, 
that  we  may  be  sure  he  would  never  affix  to  a  law  a 
penalty  which  can  with  propriety  be  declared  unjust.  Being 
omniscient,  he  understands  perfectly  what  of  evil  or  suffer- 
ing every  crime  deserves  ;  and  being  infinitely  righteous,  he 
will  in  no  case  by  statute  visit  it  beyond  its  intrinsic  demerit. 
Who  then  has  any  cause  to  complain  of  this  penal  statute  of 
the  Divine  Lawgiver?  Who  any  justifiable  reason  to 
malign  it,  whether  it  be  found  in  the  divine  or  in  a  human 
statute-book  ?  Who  behaves  well  when  he  speaks  of  it  as 
barbarous,  tyrannical,  cruel ;  when  he  charges  it  with  being 
malevolent,  revengeful,  vindictive,  inhuman  ;  as  being  a  dis- 
grace and  reproach  to  any  nation  which  has  and  is  inclined 
to  keep  it  in  her  criminal  statute-book  ;  who  calls  it  a  stain, 
a  great  blood-blot  on  its  pages  ? 

But  in  order  to  prove  the  justice  of  the  punishment  of 
death,  we  are  not  necessitated  to  fall  back  on  the  perfections 
of  the  Divine  Lawgiver ;  as  if  no  evidence  could  elsewhere 
be  obtained  for  its  support.  A  voice  appears  to  come  from 
the  depths  of  the  soul  of  universal  humanity,  declaring  the 
justice  of  the  punishment  of  death  for  the  crime  of  homicide. 
Cain,  after  the  murder  of  his  brother,  felt  so  conscious  of 
deserving  death,  and  was  so  possessed  of  the  idea  that  what 
was  his  sentiment  on  this  point,  was  or  would  be  the  senti- 
ment of  all  others  of  his  kind,  that  he  could  look  upon  them 
in  no  other  light  than  as  righteous  and  assiduous  avengers  of 


258        THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY. 

his  atrocious  deed.  The  "barbarous  people,"  as  the  Ro- 
mans considered  them,  among  whom,  after  his  shipwreck, 
Paul  fell,  evinced  the  possession  of  what  we  call  the  natural 
sentiment  in  the  human  bosom  —  that  murder  merits  death  — 
in  what  fell  from  their  lips:  "No  doubt,"  said  they  one  to 
another,  when  they  saw  the  venomous  reptile  come  forth  from 
the  fire  which  that  apostle  had  kindled,  and  fasten  on  his 
hand  :  "  No  doubt  this  man  is  a  murderer •,  whom,  though  he 
hath  escaped  the  sea,  yet  vengeance  suffereth  not  to  live." 
It  would  not  do  to  call  it  malice  or  revenge  on  the  part  of 
this  people  toward  the  apostle,  impelling  them  thus  to  speak 
to  each  other.  What  occasion  had  they  for  malice  or  re- 
venge toward  Paul  ?  No ;  they  manifestly  expressed  but 
the  natural  sentiment  possessing  their  minds.  Ancient  poets 
are  found  speaking  of  this  sentiment,  as  one  that  is  natural 
to  the  human  bosom.  That  it  is  a  deep  and  indestructible 
instinct  of  the  human  heart,  might  be  shown  by  an  appeal  to 
the  pages  of  all  history  both  sacred  and  profane ;  the  evi- 
dence is  exhibited,  with  few  and  trifling  exceptions,  in  the 
legislation  and  practice  of  all  nations,  ancient  and  modern, 
barbarous  and  civilized,  Pagan  and  Jewish,  classical  and 
Christian;  a  universal  instinct,  which,  whilst  it  began  to 
utter  itself  in  the  conscience-stricken  exclamations  of  the 
terrified  Cain,  has  reverberated  in  the  soul  of  every  mur- 
derer, from  that  day  to  this;  has  been  confirmed  by  the 
consenting  voice  of  not  only  the  historians  and  poets,  but 
philosophers  and  sages  of  all  time ;  and,  as  we  believe, 
finds  a  response  more  or  less  distinct  in  every  unso- 
phisticated human  heart.  All  mankind,  it  is  true,  may 
have  erred.  But  it  surely  becomes  the  individual  mind  to 
be  modest,  when  it  calls  in  question  the  voice  of  the  race. 


EVENING    TWENTIETH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 


Is  not  a  feeling  originated  in  the  breast  of  every  one, 
when  he  hears  of  a  deliberate  or  intentional  murder,  that  the 
perpetrator  of  the  deed  ought  not  to  live  ?  What  is  it  but  an 
instinct  of  man's  being,  a  sentiment  of  which  mankind  can 
hardly  divest  themselves,  which,  when  some  judicial  tribunal 
betrays  signs  of  a  disposition  to  let  a  known  deliberate  homi- 
cide escape,  gives  such  manifestations  of  a  determination, 
among  the  mass  of  citizens  all  around,  that  so  it  shall  not  be, 
as  to  stimulate  or  nerve  the  before  shrinking  tribunal  to 
"judge  righteous  judgment;"  to  do  what,  not  malice  or  re- 
venge, but  simple,  sober  justice  requires  ?  There  is  what,  in 
the  phraseology  of  the  day,  is  denominated  "  Lynch  law  " — 
a  desperate  remedy  indeed  for  evils  —  may  the  Ruler  Su- 
preme vouchsafe  his  needed  restraining,  controlling  influence 
to  preserve  the  supremacy  of  legal  enactment :  —  what,  far 
be  it  from  us  to  say  always^  but  sometimes,  is  that  unhand- 
some as  well  as  unhandsomely  denominated  thing,  but  an 
underlying  innate  sentiment  of  justice,  prompting  to  the 
doing  of  what,  peradventure,  the  chosen  or  appointed  magis- 
tracy, from  some  unjustifiable  cause,  leave,  or  evince  a  pro- 
pensity to  leave,  undone  ? 

God  has  not,  indeed,  as  we  have  seen,  left  it  to  this  natural 


260  THE    STATUTORY    DEATH    PENALTY. 

sense  of  retributive  justice  in  man's  bosom,  nor  to  the  judg- 
ment or  discretion  of  "  the  powers  that  be,"  though  these  be 
of  his  ordination,  to  determine  on  and  inflict  such  punishment 
for  wilful  homicide,  lest  pity  for  the  wretched  felon,  or  sym- 
pathy toward  sorrowing,  to  be  disgraced,  and  appealing  rela- 
tives, or  something  else,  should  overcome  their  better 
judgment,  and  cause  them  to  leave  the  claims  of  justice 
unsatisfied.  His  command  to  our  great  postdiluvian  progen- 
itor, which  has  been  shown  to  be  universally  and  perpetually 
binding,  renders  it  the  absolute  duty  of  civil  governments  to 
have  a  law  of  this  kind  in  their  peijal  code  ;  of  judicial  tri- 
bunals to  determine  the  cases  of  violation  ;  and  of  executive 
officers  to  carry  it  into  execution.  The  Infinite  Ruler  is  to 
be  regarded  as  the  punisher  of  the  crime  of  murder  with 
death  through  the  constituted  civil  authorities  which  are  his 
ministries  ;  inflicts  this  punishment  on  the  murderer  as  that 
which  his  crime  deserves,  and  because  he  deserves  it.  Not 
that  this  is  all  that  is  due  the  crime  of  murder.  This  as  well 
as  every  other  sin  merits  more  than  any  temporal  infliction 
of  ill.  But  the  Most  High  takes  the  after  reckoning  directly 
into  his  own  hands  ;  and,  where  there  has  been  no  flying  to 
the  vicarious  atonement  which  the  gospel  reveals,  lets  not 
justice  sleep  beyond  the  melancholy  yet  righteous  termination 
of  the  murderer's  mortal  life. 

In  our  reasonings  about  the  proper  penalty  for  murder, 
apart  from  the  direct  consideration  of  the  divine  statute  on 
the  subject,  we  should  see  to  it  that  the  idea  of  justice  or 
righteous  retribution  be  not  lost  sight  of.  It  underlies  all 
the  reasons  which  mere  human  ratiocination,  keeping  within 
its  legitimate  province,  can  find  for  the  infliction  of  punish^- 
ment  No  consideration  of  utility  or  expediency  should  be 
allowed  to  override  or  ignore  this  —  since  it  is  not  allowable 
for  society,  any  more  than  for  individuals,  to  "  do  evil  that 
good  may  come."  If  we  can  do  justly,  and  important  bene- 
ficial ends  can  be  at  the  same  time  arrived  at  or  secured, 


THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY.         261 

society  or  government  then  indeed   has  additional  weighty 
inducements  for  a  given  penal  infliction. 

In  inquiries  in  regard  to  the  ends  of  punishment,  some 
writers,  as  Dymond  for  example,  (see  Essays  on  the  Princi- 
ples of  Morality,  Essay  Third,  chapters  11  and  12,)  have 
declared  reformation,  the  reformation  of  the  criminal,  to  be 
the  primary  and  paramount  end;  and  so,  as  the  death  of  the 
murderer  would  put  him  beyond  the  reach  of  reformation, 
argue  that  capital  punishment  is  improper  —  should  not  be 
inflicted.  The  correctness  of  this  tenet,  and  so  of  the  con- 
clusion built  upon  it,  we  think  may  well  be  questioned,  and 
for  the  following  reasons  :  First,  —  Suffering  caused  for  such 
an  end,  like  the  afflictions  of  the  righteous,  possess  the  char- 
acter of  merciful  discipline  rather  than  punishment.  Secondly, 
—  If  reformation  were  the  prime  end  of  punishment,  a  large 
proportion  of  criminals,  particularly  of  the  higher  grades, 
should  go  unpunished,  since  repentance  and  reformation,  as 
to  its  spirit,  have  in  their  case  so  soon  followed  the  commission 
of  the  crime  as  to  precede  the  practicable  season  for  trial  and 
sentence.  The  prime  and  paramount  reason  for  punishment 
would  cease  to  exist  ere  it  could  ordinarily  be  inflicted. 
And  what  the  baleful  consequences  would  be  of  letting  so 
many  criminals  pass  without  punishment  it  would  be  vain  for 
us  to  attempt  to  describe,  since  they  would  far  surpass  the 
power  of  description.  But,  thirdly,  —  The  restraining  or  de- 
terring of  a  person  from  becoming  a  criminal,  rather  than  the 
reforming  of  him  after  he  has  become  one,  is  entitled  to  the 
precedence :  just  as  the  prevention  of  disease  is  ever  prefera- 
ble to  its  cure.  Much  more  is  the  preventing  of  a  person, 
through  an  appeal  to  his  fear  of  death  or  love  of  life,  from 
becoming  a  murderer,  entitled  to  priority  over  his  reformation 
after  his  becoming  one,  from  the  fact  that  in  the  former  case, 
there  is  by  the  same  means  the  preventing  of  the  life  of  some 
other  person  or  persons  from  being  sacrificed.  A  law  which, 
by  so  just  but  thrice  fearful  a  penalty  as  death,  prevents 
12* 


2C2        THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY. 

large  numbers  in  a  commonwealth  from  becoming  murderers, 
prevents,  at  the  same  time,  the  sacrifice  of  the  lives  of  far 
greater  numbers  of  its  citizens,  and  produces,  moreover? 
general  quiet  from  fear  of  so  great  an  evil  throughout  the 
length  and  breadth  of  the  commonwealth,  —  an  advantage 
itself  too  great  for  practicable  appreciation.  What  is  the 
benefit  of  a  reformation  of  those  who,  for  want  of  a  penal 
statute  of  this  kind,  become  murderers  in  a  given  common- 
wealth, compared  with  this  aggregate  ?  As  to  reformation,  — 
that  kind  of  it,  that  deep,  thorough  reformation  of  the  felon 
which  is  succeeded  in  his  case  with  life  everlasting,  is  incom- 
parably the  more  valuable  to  himself.  Now  what  sort  of 
penalty  is  the  more  likely  to  be  instrumental  in  effecting  this  ? 
The  oppugners  of  capital  punishment  are  sometimes  heard 
arguing  against  such  punishment  on  the  ground  of  its  send- 
ing an  immortal  soul  unprepared  to  its  last  account;  and 
imprisonment  for  life  is  warmly  urged,  for  this  reason,  as  a 
substitute.  Now  —  unless  the  execution  of  the  death  penalty 
follow  so  speedily  the  trial  and  conviction  as  no  judicial 
tribunal  in  any  and  particularly  in  a  Christian  country 
should  direct  or  allow  —  we  think  we  have  good  reason  for 
believing  that  the  sentence  of  death  is,  as  a  means,  better 
adapted  than  imprisonment  for  life  to  secure  so  unspeakably 
momentous  and  benign  an  end  ;  —  that  by  taking  away  the 
former  sanction  from  the  majesty  of  law,  our  criminal  juris- 
prudence would  be  deprived  of  its  highest  penal  instrumentality 
for  bringing  the  soul,  first,  into  the  dust  of  true  penitence, 
and  next,  to  the  bosom  of  the  pitying  and  potent  Saviour  of 
sinners,  even  "  the  chief."  What,  under  God,  —  it  may  with 
superlative  emphasis  be  asked,  —  so  likely  to  set  a  hard- 
ened, blood-stained  sinner  to  think  about  the  deep  hue  of 
not  only  the  one  but  all  his  sins,  the  instant  and  pressing 
need  of  pardon,  and  to  put  him  to  crying  earnestly  for  mercy 
from  the  high  and  heavenly  Source  —  mercy  that  can  roll 
away  his  guilt,  and  lift  him  up  and  station  him  on  the 


THE    STATUTORY   DEATH    PENALTY.  263 

glory-crowned  summit  of  the  paradisiac  mount  —  as  the 
certainty  indubitable  that  death  is  eminently  near,  even  at 
the  door ;  as  the  knowledge  that  on  such  a  month,  week, 
day,  near  by,  his  day  of  grace  will  terminate,  and  he  be 
ushered,  disembodied,  into  the  presence  of  his  Divine  Judge  ? 
If  that  will  not,  oh,  what  else  will,  move  and  melt  his  soul, 
and  bring  him  to  the  feet  of  sovereign,  saving  Love  ?  On 
the  other  hand,  imprisonment  for  life  has  a  tendency  to 
encourage  delay;  the  time  for  mercy  seeking  appears  to 
stretch  out  to  a  vast  length,  an  almost  interminable  dura- 
tion, as  it  were,  before  him;  many  things  may  occur;  a 
pardon  after  a  while,  even,  is  possible;  a  studiously  good 
behavior  may  secure  a  mitigation  of  the  sentence,  may  bring 
him  soon  out  of  his  prison-house  and  place  him  again  in  the 
blaze  and  bustle  of  the  world ;  ample  time  and  opportunity 
will  in  all  likelihood  be  allowed,  years  hence,  to  rush  to  the 
free  and  full  fountain  of  life.  "  Some  men  are  at  fault  with 
capital  punishment,"  says  Grotius,  "because  with  life  all 
opportunity  of  repentance  is  cut  off.  But  they  well  know 
that  good  magistrates  have  the  greatest  vigilance  in  this  mat- 
ter, and  that  no  criminal  may  be  hurried  to  execution  without 
ample  time  to  acknowledge  and  heartily  detest  his  sins.  But 
if  men  say  that  a  still  longer  period  of  life  might  produce  a 
still  deeper  repentance,  it  may  be  answered,  that  the  experi- 
ment has  often  proved  otherwise  :  there  have  been  those  to 
whom  that  pithy  and  solemn  sarcasm  of  Seneca  might  have 
been  addressed,  We  have  one  good  thing  more  to  offer  you,  and 
that  is  death"  In  E.  G.  Wakefield's  Facts  relating  to  the  Pun- 
ishment of  Death,  he  says  that  "  the  Rev.  Mr.  Cotton,  the 
Ordinary  of  Newgate,  who  has  been  chaplain  of  the  jail  for 
more  than  a  dozen  years,  has  often  acknowledged  to  him, 
that  he  does  not  remember  an  instance  of  what  he  considered 
sincere  conversion  to  religious  sentiments,  except  in  prisoners 
who  were  executed.  A  very  great  show  of  religious  fervor  is 
often  made  by  prisoners  even  from  the  moment  of  their 


264  THE    STATUTORY   DEATH   PENALTY. 

entrance  in  Newgate,  still  more  after  they  enter  the  cells. 
But  in  such  cases,  when  the  punishment  is  finally  settled  at 
something  less  than  death,  the  prisoner  invariably  behaves  as  if 
all  his  religion  had  been  hypocrisy." 

As  to  the  reforming  influence  of  imprisonment  for  life,  so 
far  as  citizenship  is  concerned,  it  puzzles  us  extremely  to 
perceive  how  this  is  to  be  ascertained  or  even  effected,  seeing 
that  he  who  is  incarcerated  for  life  is  prevented  thereby 
from  ever  becoming  a  citizen. 

A  word  was  spoken,  a  while  since,  on  the  influence  which 
the  death  penalty  has  in  deterring  men  from  the  commission 
of  murder,  and  the  associated  and  consequent  effect  of  afford- 
ing protection  to  society  from  its  direful  ravages.  Some  will 
have  it  that  imprisonment  for  life,  especially  solitary  im- 
prisonment, will  better  answer  these  ends ;  and  plead  that,  of 
the  two  penalties,  the  latter  is  the  more  terrible.  In  con- 
firmation, some  will  say  that  they  themselves  would  account 
perpetual  solitary  incarceration  the  greater  and  more  dread- 
ful punishment.  But  if  the  alternative  were  actually  pre- 
sented ;  if,  arraigned  and  convicted,  it  were  left  to  them  by 
the  court  to  choose  between  the  two  —  we  are  ready  to  de- 
clare, without  any  hesitation  or  peradventure,  what  their 
choice  would  be.  They  would,  one  and  all,  be  seen  march- 
ing into  the  prison  and  the  solitary  cell,  rather  than  to  the 
gallows ;  ay,  and  feel  considerably  inclined  to  thank  "  their 
stars,"  if  not  the  court  nor  Providence,  that  they  had  found 
such  snug  quarters.  Naught  this  side  of  the  Judgment  is  so 
dreadful  to  universal  manhood  as  death  ;  nothing  this  side  of 
the  cold,  chilling  river  which  bounds  the  territory  of  Time  is 
so  sweet  to  the  human  kind  as  life.  A  celebrated  German 
romance  writer,  when  summoned  unexpectedly  to  that  river's 
brink,  exclaimed  as  loudly  as  his  remaining  strength  would 
suffer  him,  "  Only  life  !  this  sweet  life  !  life  at  any  price,  life 
even  with  suffering,  only  life,  life,  life ! " 

To  the  strong,  deep,  instinctive  dread  of  death  which  the 


THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY.         265 

Creator  lias  implanted  in  the  constitution  of  every  sentient, 
and,  we  may  say,  of  every  living  creature,  there  are,  in  the 
case  of  the  sufferer  of  capital  punishment,  to  be  added  the 
disgrace  attendant  on  his  mode  of  death,  and  the  intensely 
terrific  and  awful  retributions  of  eternity,  of  which  his  guilty 
conscience  gives  indescribably  awful  forebodings.  All  these 
meeting  together  in  the  case  of  the  felonious  homicide  dying 
by  the  hand  of  the  executioner,  what  is  there  in  the  thought 
of  any  punishment  beside,  coming  anywhere  near  being  so 
great  and  mighty  a  preventive  of  the  crime  of  murder,  and 
protective  of  society  from  its  thrice  fearful  and  melancholy 
assaults  ?  As  corroborative  of  this  position,  and  refutatory 
of  the  position  of  those  who  contend  that  imprisonment  for 
life  is  a  greater  punishment,  and  a  more  potent  or  influential 
means  of  deterring  or  restraining  men  from  the  perpetration 
of  murder,  and  of  affording  security  to  society  from  its  dreadful 
havoc,  we  might  refer  you  to  the  experience  of  several  gov- 
ernments, who,  after  a  trial  of  a  few  years,  were  induced  to 
abandon  their  experiment.  The  principal  cases  which  our 
memory  enables  us  to  suggest  are  those  of  the  Empress 
Catherine  of  Russia,  and  the  Grand  Duke,  Leopold,  of 
Tuscany.  In  the  Conversations  Lexicon,  a  work  of  un- 
doubted authority,  it  is  declared :  "  That  even  in  those 
countries  where  the  governments,  from  a  mistaken  feeling  of 
humanity,  abolished  capital  punishments,  they  were  com- 
pelled again  to  introduce  them ;  because,  according  to  the 
prevailing  views  of  men,  death  is  regarded  as  the  greatest 
evil,  to  avoid  which,  men  will  willingly  submit  to  the  most 
laborious  life,  so  long  as  there  is  any  hope  of  escaping  from 
it ;  and  because,  moreover,  the  punishment  of  death  is  the 
most  terrible  of  all  penalties." 

As  the  Noachic  statute  and  penalty  have  reference  exclu- 
sively to  the  crime  of  murder,  in  the  full  and  proper  sense  of 
that  term,  so  have  we,  in  our  present  advocacy.  It  would  be 
treating  us  unjustly  not  to  bear  in  mind  that  it  is  for  murder, 


266         THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY. 

not  anything  short  of  it  —  for  intentional  murder,  not  accident- 
al homicide,  nor  for  homicide  in  palpable  self-defence  — for 
murder  clearly  proved,  and  this  before  a  proper  tribunal,  not  a 
case  uncertain,  or  insufficiently  established  by  evidence,  nor  a 
case  clearly  made  out  before  a  self-constituted  body  —  that  we 
plead  for  the  infliction,  by  the  properly  appointed  instrument- 
ality, of  the  punishment  of  death.  As  for  any  penalty  short 
of  this  for  the  extreme  crime  just  designated,  whether  it  be 
imprisonment  for  life,  or  something  else,  it  is,  however  kindly 
intended,  but  a  poor  substitute,  in  our  view,  for  the  divinely 
selected,  authorized,  and  enjoined  penalty.  Let  imprison- 
ment for  life,  which  seems  to  be  the  favorite  with  the  ma- 
jority of  the  opponents  of  the  death  penalty ;  let  it  be  the 
substituted  penalty  for  murder;  and  let  it  be  without  fail 
ever  inflicted  in  full,  and  still  it  is  so.  God's  wisdom  and 
God's  benevolence  —  of  both  of  which  there  is  a  signal  dis- 
play in  the  Noachic  ordinance  —  have  been,  are,  and  ever 
will  be,  superior  to  man's.  Whilst  we  would  not  present  the 
lenity,  laxity,  or  abuse,  as  an  argument  —  yet  we  may  be 
permitted,  en  passant,  to  ask,  What  more,  scarcely,  is  the 
punishment  of  imprisonment  for  life,  as  most  commonly 
executed,  than  a  name  ?  We  quote  from  good  authority,  from 
a  citizen  of  deservedly  high  repute  in  that  commonwealth, 
when  we  state  as  a  fact  the  following :  "  In  the  State  of  New 
York,  the  average  length  of  time  spent  in  prison  by  those 
criminals  who  have  been  sentenced  to  imprisonment  for  life, 
has  been  six  years  !  " 

Let  an  additional  consideration  be  urged.  Suppose  the 
adversaries  of  the  death  penalty  for  murder,  in  any  country 
—  say  in  the  United  States  —  to  have  their  will.  In  every 
state  of  that  Republic  this  penalty  is  abolished  ;  and  the  penal- 
ty of  imprisonment  for  a  term  of  years,  or,  we  will  say,  for  life, 
is  put  in  its  room.  The  crime  of  murder,  and  several  other 
crimes,  theft  and  robbery  to  a  certain  amount,  for  example, 
then  stand  penally  on  the  same  footing.  A  like  motive  or 


THE    STATUTORY   DEATII   PENALTY.  207 

inducement  is  presented  to  all  the  inhabitants  of  the  land  to 
abstain  from  any  one  of  these  crimes  as  from  the  other.  It 
is  said  to  them,  If  you  murder  another,  or  steal  another's 
goods  to  a  certain  amount,  or  rob  a  person  of  such  a  sum  of 
money,  you  shall,  if  detected,  if  the  crime  be  proved  against 
you,  be  thrown  into  prison,  and  be  confined  there  during 
your  mortal  life.  Look  then  at  the  estimate,  relatively,  that 
is  set  on  the  life  of  a  human  being.  It  is  worth  such  an 
amount  of  goods,  or  such  a  sum  of  money  :  This  proclaimed 
to  the  people  of  the  land  —  proclaimed  by  its  statutes. 
From  north  to  south,  east  to  west,  the  proclamation  is  made, 
that  the  life  of  a  man,  woman,  or  child,  is  worth  so  much 
money,  or  such  a  quantity  of  goods.  And  so  is  there  a  like 
estimate  made  as  to  crime.  The  crime  of  murder,  and  the 
crimes  of  theft  and  robbery  to  a  certain  amount  of  goods  or 
money,  are  alike  as  to  magnitude  or  guilt.  This  also  is  pro- 
claimed, through  the  medium  of  statute,  throughout  the 
length  and  breadth  of  the  country.  What  —  we  are  disposed 
to  press  this  question  —  what  will  be  the  effect,  morally  and 
practically,  in  that  land  ?  Tell  us,  ye  kind,  philanthropic 
souls,  who  love  human  life  so  vastly,  that  ye  would  as  soon 
have  your  neighbor  lose  such  an  amount  of  goods,  or  in 
money,  as  to  lose  his  mortal  life,  —  let  us  have  a  sober, 
candid  response  to  the  interrogatory  just  stated.  No  wonder 
ye  scratch  your  heads,  and  look  somewhat  embarrassed  or 
puzzled. 

Let  us  cast  our  eye  at  another  aspect  of  the  case.  Things 
stand  according  to  the  foregoing  supposition.  The  law, 
punishing  murder  with  death,  is  repealed.  Another,  affixing 
the  penalty  of  incarceration  for  life,  is  the  substitute.  The 
crime  of  theft  and  robbery,  to  a  certain  amount,  there  are 
laws  forbidding  under  a  like  penalty.  Let  a  man  be  detect- 
ed and  convicted  of  either  of  these  crimes,  and  his  home  is  a 
prison  until  "the  golden  bowl  be  broken."  Here  are  a 
hundred  or  a  thousand  men,  in  different  parts  of  the  broad  land, 


268         THE  STATUTORY  DEATH  PENALTY. 

who  are  committing  a  theft ;  are  stealing  an  amount  of  goods 
for  which,  if  the  crime  be  proved  against  them,  they  must 
suffer  the  penalty  just  stated.  Just  as  they  have  perpetrated 
the  furtive  deed,  their  eye  meets  the  eye  of  some  one,  each, 
that  has  witnessed  their  act  of  stealth.  This  witness  will,  if 
he  have  the  opportunity,  expose  him,  and  be  the  means  of  his 
arrest  and  conviction.  Each  of  the  hundred  or  thousand 
thieves,  knowing  this,  will  say  to  himself,  "  Let  me  kill  this 
witness  and  I  shall  avoid  detection.  If  I,  in  killing  him, 
should  even  be  discovered  and  convicted  of  the  crime  of 
taking  away  his  life,  I  shall  fare  no  worse  than  if  I  let  the 
witness  escape.  Whereas,  if  he  be  killed,  there  may  be  no 
one  to  witness  against  me  for  this  latter  offence,  —  I  see 
none," — and  he  takes  away  his  life.  A  hundred  or  a  thousand 
lives,  according  to  the  supposition,  are  at  once  thus  sacrificed, 
and  ten  thousand  hearts  are  wrung  with  anguish.  On  the 
night  succeeding  the  transaction  just  depicted,  a  hundred  or 
a  thousand  robbers,  in  different  sections  of  the  wide  country, 
find  each  his  victim ;  have  wrested  from  him  such  a  sum  as, 
if  convicted,  will  subject  him  to  perpetual  imprisonment. 
His  victim,  if  suffered  to  escape  with  life,  will  be  a  witness 
against  him.  These  robbers  say,  each,  as  did  the  thieves, 
"  Let  me  kill  him  and  I  may  avoid  detection.  At  the  worst, 
I  can  fare  no  worse.  I  may,  probably  will,  escape  altogether, 
if  I  let  out  his  heart's  blood."  The  dagger  at  once  finds  its 
way  to  the  seat  of  life.  Again  a  hundred  or  a  thousand  souls 
are  hurried  away  from  their  mortal  tenement,  and  everywhere 
through  the  land  are  to  be  witnessed  mourning,  lamentation, 
and  woe.  —  O,  how  short-sighted  and  mistaken  a  philan- 
throphy,  how  stolid  and  cruel  a  benevolence,  is  that  of  the 
men  who  would  erase  from  every  penal  code  the  law  which 
exacts  the  death  of  the  detected  and  convicted  murderer! 
The  heads  of  these  men  are  amazingly  at  fault,  whether  or 
not  their  hearts  be.  It  is  our  heart's  desire  and  prayer  to 
God,  that  they  may  never  succeed  in  expunging  from  the 


THE    STATUTORY    DEATH    PENALTY.  269 

statute-books  of  earth  that  statute  of  heaven,  which  has  such 
a  heart  of  benevolence  and  face  of  smiling  love ;  to  push 
away  such  an  aegis  of  protection  to  the  lifeblood  of  untold 
numbers ;  to  batter  down  such  a  wall  of  defence,  or  destroy 
so  mighty  and  invaluable  a  safeguard  to  society. 

Bear  with  us  on  this  theme  a  moment  longer,  whilst  we 
mention  and  essay  to  dispatch  one  other  and  a  somewhat 
choice  argument  of  the  adversaries  of  "legalized  murder." 
If  this  one  of  their  strongholds  cannot  be  demolished  without 
the  consumption  of  much  time,  be  assured  that  to  relieve 
your  patience,  already  taxed  considerably  beyond  what  we 
had  anticipated,  it  will  be  left  for  the  pickaxes  and  battering 
rams  of  others  to  effect  a  demolition.  And  what  is  this 
stronghold?  Why,  the  following:  —  "That  society  comes 
wholly  from  voluntary  compact;  that  inasmuch  as  govern- 
ment, thus  originating,  derives  its  rights  from  the  delegated 
rights  of  individuals,  and  individuals  cannot  delegate  what 
they  themselves  possess  not;  and  inasmuch  as  no  man  has 
a  right  to  take  away  his  own  life  —  therefore,  no  man  can 
impart  this  right  to  others :  consequently  no  government  can 
have  the  right,  in  any  circumstances,  to  take  away  life." 

Now,  what  we  may  reasonably  exact  from  those  whose  is 
this  reasoning,  is,  to  establish  their  premise ;  to  prove  that 
society  is  the  creature  of  social  or  voluntary  compact.  Let 
them  show  this  to  be  true,  ere  they  attempt  to  prove  or 
disprove  anything  from  it.  We  opine  that  they  may  find  it 
as  difficult  to  show  when  men  met  together  for  this  end,  as 
those  holding  to  the  human  invention  of  oral  language  find  it 
to  show  when  that  convention  met  to  talk  about  inventing 
words  and  forming  a  language.  When  was  such  convention 
held?  Let  them  produce  the  records  of  the  meeting.  Let 
them  point  us  to  the  history  of  its  proceedings.  Surely  so 
important  a  meeting  would  not  be  suffered  to  pass  utterly 
unrecorded.  The  pen  of  history  —  does  it  make  no  mention 
of  so  momentous  a  transaction?  Where  are  the  records? 


270  THE    STATUTORY    DEATH    PENALTY. 

Where  the  historic  account?  Until  they  produce  some 
reliable  testimony  on  this  point,  we  may  not  feel  ourselves 
in  possession  of  enough  light  to  keep  us  from  regarding  their 
premise  as  but  a  figment  of  the  imagination.  —  The  brief 
residue  of  the  argument,  relating  to  the  penalty  which  we 
are  considering,  will  be  offered  when  we  meet  again. 


EVENING    TWENTY-FIRST. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

Civil  Society  is  an  ordinance  of  God ;  it  must  be  established, 
therefore,  upon  the  principles  which  God  has  established. 

We  have,  on  a  former  occasion,  spoken  of  the  Noachic  or- 
dinance as  containing  the  sanction  and  divine  authority  of  a 
civil  magistracy ;  that  to  <l  man  "  in  this  capacity  is  com- 
mitted, by  the  Supreme  Legislator  and  Governor,  the  solemn 
power,  authority,  and  duty,  of  recompensing  the  murderer;  — 
and  what  recompense  is  due,  and  to  be  visited  on  the  blood- 
stained felon,  has  not  been  left  to  the  judgment  or  discretion 
of  the  magistracy  to  determine.  He  from  whom  the  latter 
derived  their  authority  has  said,  Thus  shall  it  be  done : 
"Whoso  sheddeth  man's  blood,  by  the  constituted  powers 
(human)  shall  his  blood  be  shed."  The  power  of  the  sword, 
the  power  of  life  and  death,  as  the  highest  and  most  awful 
sanction  of  the  human  government,  is,  then,  conferred  by  that 
ordinance  directly  from  God  upon  the  civil  magistracy.  This 
highest  function  of  government  is  to  be  regarded  as  a  person- 
ification, exponent,  or  representative  of  all  its  just  functions. 

But,  meeting  those  oppugners  of  capital  punishment  whose 
reasoning  is  such  as  was  toward  the  close  of  the  last  Exercise 
stated,  in  a  manner  on  their  assumed  ground,  it  may  be 


272  THE    STATUTORY   DEATH    PENALTY. 

replied  to  them  :  Man  has  by  nature,  as  we  speak,  the  right  of 
self-defence ;  and  if  a  man's  family  be  violently  set  upon, 
with  palpable  intent  to  kill,  or  to  the  manifest  endangering  of 
life,  he  has  a  right  to  defend  them,  though  at  the  risk  of  the 
life  of  him  who  has  made  the  inchoate  murderous  assault. 
Now  this  right  of  self-defence,  possessed  by  every  man  in  a 
state  of  nature  —  you  observe  we  are  using  language  of  a 
type  to  suit  that  of  our  opposing  reasoners  —  he  gives  up,  to 
a  certain  degree,  in  the  compact  of  society.  It  becomes  in 
part  —  to  the  extent  of  the  surrendry  —  the  business  of  the 
government  to  protect  and  defend  individuals  ;  and  the  privi- 
lege so  delegated  gives  to  the  government  the  right  to  take 
away  life.  A  government  must  have  the  power  of  life  and 
death  lodged  with  it  for  the  purposes  of  human  society. 
Wherever  civil  society  exists,  it  is  one  of  its  inherent  rights, 
and  wherever  civil  government  has  any  existence,  it  is  one 
of  its  paramount  duties,  to  administer  justice  so  far  as  the 
conservation  of  the  general  well-being  may  require ;  so  far  at 
least  as  to  defend  and  protect  the  lives  of  its  citizens ;  of 
course  to  inflict  the  (what  we  have  shown  to  be)  just  penalty 
of  death  upon  the  man-slayer  —  upon  him  who  has  already 
taken  away  the  life  of  another  —  whenever  that  penalty  is 
necessary,  in  the  common  and  practical  sense  of  the  word,  for 
the  protection  of  the  lives  of  others ;  for  the  safety  and  de- 
fence of  the  community  in  general.  No  less  considerable 
a  document  than  the  Declaration  of  American  Independ- 
ence declares  the  design  of  government  to  be,  to  protect  the 
governed  in  the  enjoyment  of  their  inalienable  rights,  life, 
liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness.  If  our  opponents  con- 
tend that  government  has  no  right  to  take  away  an  "  inalien- 
able right"  on  any  ground,  even  for  the  protection  of  society, 
they  must  then  abandon  the  idea,  must  surrender  it  to  their 
own  argument,  that  government  has  the  right  to  punish  a 
criminal,  a  murderer  even,  with  imprisonment  for  life,  —  be- 
cause liberty  is  an  inalienable  right,  of  which  he  is  deprived, 


THE  FLOOD  OF  NOAH  NOT  TO  REAPPEAR.     273 

and  ever,  beyond  recall  or  recovery,  by  such  imprisonment. 
Their  argument  or  inference  from  delegated  rights  will  oper- 
ate against  the  right  of  government  to  punish  a  man  with  im- 
prisonment for  life,  as  well  as  with  the  loss  of  life.  The 
argument  runs  thus :  No  man  has  a  right  to  imprison  him- 
self for  life,  in  a  solitary  cell,  an  outcast  or  recluse  from 
society,  a  contemner  of  its  relative  duties.  But  if  he  have 
not  this  right  in  himself,  he  cannot  delegate  or  resign  it  to 
others ;  therefore  no  human  government  has  a  right  to  im- 
prison any  man  for  life.  The  argument  would  therefore 
prove  too  much  for  those  who  advocate  the  punishment  of 
imprisonment  for  life  as  a  substitute  for  the  punishment  of 
death  to  the  murderer. 

Let  us  say,  in  conclusion  on  this  topic,  we  feel  that  we 
cannot  express  too  high  a  regard  for  the  universally  and  per- 
petually binding  statute  which  the  Lawgiver  Supreme  gave 
to  our  patriarch  for  his  posterity.  And  without  any  undue 
or  boastful  professions  of  benevolence  toward  our  species,  we 
must  say  that,  as  we  feel  exceedingly  unwilling  that  any 
greater  number  than  now  do  should  become  murderers,  and 
likewise  any  more  than  now  do  should  become  victims  of  the 
murderer's  bullet  or  blade,  the  desire  intense  must  be  indulged 
by  us,  that  men,  in  their  fatuity  or  madness,  may  never  suc- 
ceed in  efforts  for  effecting  the  abrogation,  in  any  land,  of  so 
benignly  preventive  and  protective  a  statute. 

But,  after  all  the  words  of  encouragement  which  have  been 
yet  addressed  by  the  Lord  to  the  postdiluvian  family,  intended 
for  themselves  and  their  proximate  and  remote  progeny,  they 
were  still  liable  to  be  troubled  with  fearful  apprehensions 
from  another  source.  The  gathering  clouds  of  the  heavens, 
or  the  storm  which  with  winged  speed  should  come  sweeping 
across  the  horizon,  might  present  an  impediment  to  their 
multiplication  and  their  prosperity;  might  induce  a  catas- 
trophe of  like  terrific  and  melancholy  character  and  conse- 
quences with  that  from  which  the  earth  had  just  emerged,  and 


274  THE   FLOOD    OF   NOAH   NOT    TO    REAPPEAR. 

from  which  the  Noachidge  in  their  life-boat  had,  of  all  the 
multitudinous  family  of  man,  alone  been  preserved. 

We  are  told  by  Josephus  that  Noah,  in  a  persuasion  that 
Jehovah  had  doomed  mankind  to  destruction,  lay  under  a 
mortal  dread  for  fear  of  a  repetition  of  the  diluvial  judgment, 
and  that  it  would  end  in  an  annual  inundation ;  so  that  he 
presented  himself  before  the  Lord  with  sacrifices  and 
prayers,  humbly  beseeching  him  "  that  nature  might  there- 
after proceed  in  its  former  orderly  course;  and  that  he 
would  not  bring  on  so  great  a  judgment  any  more,  by  which 
the  whole  race  of  creatures  might  be  in  danger  of  destruc- 
tion ;  but  that  having  now  punished  the  wicked,  he  would  of 
his  clemency  spare  the  remainder,  and  such  as  he  had  hither- 
to judged  fit  to  be  delivered  from  so  severe  a  calamity ;  for 
that  otherwise  these  last  must  be  more  miserable  than  the 
first,  and  that  they  must  be  condemned  to  a  worse  condition 
than  the  others,  unless  they  be  suffered  to  escape  entirely  ; 
that  is,  if  they  be  reserved  for  another  deluge,  while  they 
must  be  afflicted  with  the  terror  and  the  sight  of  the  first 
deluge,  and  must^also  be  destroyed  by  a  second."  (Lib.  1, 
ch.  3.)  It  is,  however,  not  to  be  supposed  probable  that  our 
patriarch  was  tormented  with  a  dread  of  a  future  annual 
return  of  such  a  judgment,  inasmuch  as  he  knew  that  the 
great  and  criminal  causes  of  the  deluge  were  such  as  could 
not  happen  annually.  Besides,  —  having  found  favor  in  the 
eyes  of  the  Deity,  and  been  so  distinguishingly  and  mirac- 
ulously preserved  from  such  an  everywhere  reaching  judg- 
ment, he.  can  hardly  be  supposed  to  have  so  soon  lost  all 
confidence  in  his  great  and  merciful  Preserver,  and  to  be  so 
under  the  dominion  of  abject  and  servile  fear.  We  may 
therefore  conclude  his  sacrificial  oblation  and  prayer  to  have 
in  them  more  of  the  eucharistic  than  of  the  deprecatory.  It 
is  not  improbable  that  he,  on  this  occasion  as  well  as  various 
others,  indeed,  did  beseech  the  Most  High  and  Most  Mighty 
that  he  would  save  his  posterity  from  running  into  those 


THE    COVENANT   AGAINST    IT.  275 

excesses  of  wickedness,  that  "  superfluity  of  naughtiness," 
into  which  the  inhabitants  of  the  antediluvian  age  had  so 
audaciously  and  madly  run  ;  and  the  belief,  also,  may  very 
rationally  be  entertained  that  it  was  not  so  much  for  Noah's 
sake  as  for  that  of  his  sons  and  their  posterity,  that  God  did 
what  we  are  about  to  speak  of. 

The  devastating  Flood,  with  its  thrice  calamitous  effects, 
was  still  full  before  the  mind's  eye  of  that  family  which  in 
their  big  life-boat  had  navigated  the  world  of  waters ;  and 
the  clustering  and  swelling  emotions  which  had  been  excited, 
had  yet  scarcely  found  time  for  inceptive  subsidence.  How 
know  we,  they  might  say,  after  the  encouraging  averments 
which  had  yet  reached  their  ear  —  how  know  we  but  that 
some  time  ere  by  nature's  slow  process  of  decay  our  bodies 
become  lifeless,  or,  if  not  so  soon,  at  least  during  the  time  of 
some  generation  of  our  descendants  not  very  far  in  the 
future,  there  may  sweep  over  the  globe  a  calamity  similar 
to  that  with  which  it  has  just  been  visited?  How  know  we 
but  the  fruit  of  our  body,  or  the  fruits  of  our  toil,  may  some 
day  lie  beneath  the  waves  of  another  mighty  and  desolating 
inundation  ? 

In  kind  and  condescending  replication  God  says,  "  After 
this  manner  ye  shall  know  it  —  for  the  purpose  which  I  have 
had  in  my  heart  shall  be  put  into  words,  and  something  more 
attractive  and  expressive  than  words:  I  will  never  again 
smite  the  earth  with  so  great,  so  wide,  and  awful  a  judgment 
—  though  the  native  human  heart  has  not  by  the  flood  of 
waters  been  so  washed  from  its  filthiness  as  that  the  latter 
will  not  show  itself,  and  early,  by  the  streams  which  will  flow 
from  it.  While  the  earth  remaineth,  seed-time  and  harvest, 
and  cold  and  heat,  and  summer  and  winter,  and  day  and  night 
shall  not  cease.  I  promise,  yea,  I  solemnly  covenant,  that  all 
flesh  shall  never  again  be  destroyed  by  a  deluge.  Nor  shall 
you  or  your  progeny  be  suffered  to  forget  this  my  veritable 
promise,  my  solemn  covenant.  That  arch  which  was  seen 


276  THE    BOW    OF    PROMISE. 

attending  the  calm  rains  before,  but,  amid  the  descending  tor- 
rents which  helped  to  swell  the  waters  of  the  deluge,  was 
not  seen,  —  that  gorgeous  arch  shall  hereafter  appear  in  such 
frequency,  and  in  such  phenomenal  connection,  as,  whilst  it 
shall  excite  your  unfailing  admiration  by  its  beauty,  shall 
serve  to  allay  your  fears  by  its  betokening  significancy.  By 
its  appearance,  spanning  from  time  to  time  the  heavens  and 
at  well  selected  seasons,  you  shall  be  reminded  of  this  my 
covenant.  This  bow  of  promise,  skirting  the  forefront  of 
darkness,  shall  tell  of  preservation,  not  of  destruction  ;  of 
smiling  peace,  not  of  frowning  wrath.  At  the  occurrence  of 
that  phenomenon,  looking  upward,  above  your  head  shall  ap- 
pear the  calm  cerulean  vault,  tending  to  make  or  preserve  as 
calm  the  spirit ;  and  off,  fronting  the  retiring  cloud  in  the  dis- 
tance, shall  be  spread  the  bow  that  God  has  bent ;  at  sight  of 
which  you  will  have  a  renewed,  a  vivid  recollection  of 
Jehovah's  sure  and  gracious  covenant."  We  say  gracious,  for 
Noah's  neither  proximate  nor  remote  posterity,  in  their  dif- 
ferent and  successive  generations,  would  know  but  that,  in 
this  particular,  what  has  been  shall  again  be,  except  for  this. 
The  assured  tranquillity  which  this  covenant  has  been  and 
will  be  instrumental  of  producing  and  preserving  among  men 
is  great  and  invaluable.  But  the  benefits  of  it  were  not  to  be 
confined  to  man.  Cast  your  eye  over  the  record,  and  you 
will  see  that,  as  in  the  nature  of  them,  so  in  the  divine  inten- 
tion, they  were  to  extend  to  all  the  animal  creation,  unable, 
as  they  would  be,  to  understand  the  token.  So  comprehen- 
sive, young  gentlemen,  is  the  beneficence  of  Heaven.  The 
phrase  "  with  you  "  (10th  verse)  having  respect  to  the  inferior 
races  of  living  things,  is  so  repeated  as  to  give  it  emphasis, 
and  not  only  points  to  the  intimate  relation  constituted  by  the 
Creator  between  man  and  man,  but  to  teach,  by  so  high 
example  as  the  divine,  mindfulness,  kindness,  the  opposite  of 
carelessness  and  cruelty,  toward  the  lower  orders  of  crea- 
tures. 


THE    BOW    OF   PROMISE.  277 

It  is,  we  believe,  a  somewhat  common  opinion  that  that 
specified  token  of  the  covenant,  the  rainbow,  was  a  thing 
unknown  prior  to  this  period;  and  we  must  acknowledge 
that  that  language,  in  our  version  —  "  I  do  set  my  bow  in  the 
cloud,"  &c.,  (Gen.  9  :  13,  14)  —  is,  in  the  minds  of  ordinary 
readers,  well  adapted  to  originate  and  nourish  such  an  im- 
pression. Nor  is  this  impression  wholly  confined  to  common 
readers.  Among  the  learned  there  have  not  been  wanting 
some  who  not  only  hold  to,  but  advocate  it.  "  Though  it  had 
rained,"  say  they,  "  before  the  deluge,  yet  the  superintending 
Providence  which  caused  the  rainbow  to  appear  as  a  pledge 
of  the  assurance  that  he  gave,  (that  the  world  should  never 
more  be  destroyed  by  water,)  might  have  prevented  the  con- 
currence of  such  circumstances  in  the  time  of  rain  as  were 
essentially  necessary  for  the  formation  of  a  bow.  It  might 
have  rained  when  the  sun  was  set,  or  when  he  was  more 
than  fifty-four  degrees  high,  when  no  bow  could  be  seen,  and 
the  rain  might  continue  between  the  spectator  and  .the  sun 
until  the  clouds  were  expended,  or  in  any  other  direction  but 
that  of  an  opposition  to  the  sun."  (See  Ewing's  Lectures  on 
Nat.  Philosophy.)  Such  is  their  philosophical  reasoning; 
next,  as  to  their  moral.  Allowing  the  first  appearance  of  the 
celestial  arch  not  to  have  been  anterior  to  this,  the  effect 
would  be  far  more  vivid  and  striking,  apparently,  upon  the 
mind  of  Noah  and  his  sons,  than  had  the  splendid  spectacle 
been  to  them  already  familiar.  Admitting  the  causes  pro- 
ducing it  to  have  existed  from  the  creation,  it  does  not 
necessarily  follow  that  the  phenomenon  itself  had  been 
actually  witnessed  until  subsequent  to  the  deluge.  The 
occurrence  antecedently  might  have  been  prevented  by  the 
Divine  Ruler,  from  a  foresight  of  the  moral  uses  to  which  he 
designed  to  have  it  applied  after  the  flood.  A  dissipation  or 
suppression  of  all  rising  fears  of  a  diluvial  occurrence  in 
future,  similar  to  the  one  just  past  —  an  assurance  of  security 
against  it  —  this  being  the  grand  end  of  the  sign  fixed  on  — • 
13 


278  THE    BOW    OF   PROMISE. 

a  novel  may  be  rationally  supposed  more  efficacious  than  a 
familiar  phenomenon  toward  this  benign  end.  —  Thus  it 
might  be  very  plausibly  reasoned ;  whilst  the  setting  of  the 
bow  in  the  cloud,  as  is  the  phraseology  of  the  record,  to  serve 
as  a  token,  seems  to  forbid  the  rational  entertainment  of  the 
idea,  that  it  was  a  spectacle  to  the  sight  of  which  our  post- 
diluvian patriarch  and  family  had  been  accustomed. 

But  then,  on  the  other  hand,  it  may  be  plead,  First,  That 
the  rainbow  being  the  natural  effect  of  the  refraction  and 
reflection  of  the  sun's  rays  fa*M1g  on  water,  and  as  rains  were 
probably  not  less  frequen  vic*than  posterior  to  the  deluge, 
it  would  require  quit  stretch  of  the  reasoning  faculty  to 
bring  it  to  the  cone  ^lOn  that  the  rainbow  had  not  been  a 
familiar  phenomenon  in  the  first  age  of  the  world  as  well  as 
since.  Secondly,  That  the  argument  is  by  no  means  con- 
clusive in  support  of  the  forementioned  idea,  which  is  sought 
to  be  drawn  from  the  word  "set"  in  our  version,  since 
the  original  word  ^nro  nathatti,  translated  set,  in  numerous 
instances  in  the  Scriptures  imports  appointing  or  consti- 
tuting, as  might  be  easily  shown.  The  reading  of  the 
verse  would  then  be,  "  I  do  appoint  my  bow  in  the  cloud  to 
be  a  token  of  the  covenant  between  me  and  the  earth." 
Thirdly,  The  argument  employed  by  God  with  the  eight 
souls  and  coming  progeny,  to  allay  or  prevent  rising  fears, 
runs  substantially  on  this  wise :  —  You  have  been  familiar, 
in  times  past,  with  that  phenomenon,  in  certain  junctures,  the 
rainbow  —  as  you  have  been  with  the  rising  and  setting  of 
the  sun.  From  your  past  observation  or  experience  you  are 
led  to  infer  that  that  phenomenon  will,  from  time  to  time,  in 
similar  junctures,  appear  in  perpetuity  up  to  the  world's  end, 
3ust  as  you  infer  from  your  past  observation  of  the  sun's 
rising  and  setting,  that  this  process  will  be  perpetual.  Now 
as  perpetual  or  unfailing  as  you  believe  will  be  the  rainbow's 
appearance,  sopshall  it  be  with  this  my  promise  or  covenant. 
It  shall  not  fail.  You  can  surely  repose  as  firm  reliance  on 


THE  OCCUPATION  ENTERED  UPON.         279 

my  word,  as  you  do  respecting  the  perpetuity  of  the  course 
of  nature.  Have  you  ever  known  it  fail  ?  You  believe  it 
never  will.  You  shall  be  reminded  of  the  unfailing  character 
of  this  my  covenant  in  all  future  appearances  of  my  bow  in 
the  cloud.  I  appoint  that  bow  as  a  token  for  all  time  to 
come.  Seeing  it,  you  shall  be  reminded  of  my  standing, 
perpetual  covenant.  You  will  be  assured  from  it,  that  no 
such  wide-sweeping,  devastating  judgment  shall  again  visit 
the  earth. 

It  was  a  beautiful  token  which  the  Most  High  fixed-  on  or 
appointed,  you  will  all  acknowledge ;  and  one  which,  not 
occurring  so  frequently  —  like  the  rising  or  the  setting  of  the 
sun  —  as  through  great  familiarity  with  the  sight,  to  fail  to 
answer  that  benign  end,  —  so,  on  the  other  hand,  being  of  not 
too  infrequent  occurrence  for  it,  appears  remarkably  well 
adapted  to  answer  the  intended  beneficent  purpose. 

After  the  transpiring  of  the  interesting  matters  to  which 
our  attention  has  been  last  directed,  and  by  which  Noah  and 
his  sons  could  not  but  be  greatly  encouraged,  the  next 
mention  which  the  Mosaic  narrative  affords  concerning  our 
esteemed  postdiluvian  father,  relates  to  his  resumption  of  an 
occupation  which  he  may  be  supposed  to  have  mainly  prose- 
cuted in  earlier  life,  to  wit,  that  of  husbandry.  Descending 
with  his  family  from  the  mountain  range  where  the  ark  finally 
rested,  (if  any  such  elevation  is  to  be  indeed  considered  as  its 
stranding-place,)  into  the  lower  hill  country,  or  the  plain,  we 
cannot  say  how  far  distant  —  not  improbably  contiguous  — • 
and  taking  the  more  useful  animals  with  them,  whether  for 
service  or  for  sustenance,  —  he,  assisted  by  his  sons,  com- 
menced tilling  the  ground ;  and  at  length,  among  other  things 
that  they  did,  planted  a  vineyard:  a  thing  with  which  these 
postdiluvians  were  probably  not  unacquainted  the  other  side 
of  the  waters.  For,  in  antediluvian  times,  animal  food  not 
being  an  allowed  esculent,  it  may  reasonably  be  supposed 
that  along  with  other  articles  yielding  nutriment,  the  vine 


280  THE    PLANTING    OF    THE    VINEYARD. 

would  be  cultivated  for  the  sake  of  its  nutritious  fruit ;  and 
this  rather  than  for  the  expressed  juice  as  a  beverage. 

How  long  subsequent  to  his  egress  from  the  ark  Noah 
"  planted  his  vineyard,"  and  how  long  after  his  vines  began 
to  yield  their  luscious  treasures,  the  occurrence  of  which  we 
are  about  to  speak  transpired,  we  cannot  certainly  say.  But, 
as  the  three  sons  of  our  patriarch  had  none  of  them  any 
children  until  after  they  left  the  vessel,  and  as  one  of  the  sons 
of  Ham,  we  mean  Canaan,  was  probably  not  only  born,  but 
quite  a  lad  at  the  time  that  Ham  behaved  in  the  unbecoming 
manner  we  shall  hear  of —  a  boy  old  enough  to  participate, 
after  some  manner,  in  the  father's  crime,  and  so  in  the  conse- 
quent malediction,  —  it  may  hence  be  concluded  that  an 
interval  had  elapsed  of  at  least  some  eighteen  or  twenty 
years.  In  the  record  (Gen.  10 :  6,)  Canaan  being  placed 
the  last  of  Ham's  four  sons,  seems  to  indicate  that  he  was  the 
youngest ;  —  if  so,  the  intervening  period  would  be  consider- 
ably longer.  Bedford  extends  the  interval  to  over  one 
hundred  years  (Chronology,  pp.  178,  180)  ;  but  this  appears 
to  us  an  unreasonable  extreme.  The  writer  of  the  article 
Noah,  in  Kitto's  Cyclopedia,  says,  "  The  narrative  makes  it 
evident  that  the  occurrence,  the  invention  of  wine-making, 
must  have  been  some  years  after  the  cessation  of  the  flood ; 
for  not  Ham  himself,  but  Canaan  his  son,  is  the  first  and  em- 
phatic object  of  the  prophetic  curse.  We  cannot  with  reason 
assume  less  than  sixteen  or  eighteen  years."  In  another 
article  from  the  same  pen,  it  is  said,  "  The  undutiful  conduct 
of  Ham  and  his  fourth  son  cannot  well  be  assigned  to  a  point 
of  time  earlier  than  twenty  or  thirty  years  after  the  Flood." 
(Dispersion  of  Nations.)  The  premise  on  which  this  con- 
clusion is  based  may  not  perhaps  strike  every  one  as  the 
most  certain.  It  being  a  prophetic  malediction  which  fell  on 
Ham,  extending  to  his  posterity  in  every  line  and  not  barely 
that  of  Canaan,  the  reason  why  the  last  named  son  specially 


THE    ALLEGED    SIN    OF   THE   PATRIARCH.  281 

and  alone  was  mentioned  may  have  been,  because  that  in  the 
historian's  subsequent  narrative  the  fate  of  Canaan's  family 
or  descendants,  consentaneous  with  the  prophetic  malediction, 
would  become,  in  a  manner  necessarily,  a  matter  of  particular 
detail ;  and  not  because  of  any  participation  by  Canaan  in 
the  crime  of  his  father.  Living,  as  Moses  did,  when  the 
Israelites,  who  descended  from  Shem,  were  about  to  take  pos- 
session of  the  land  of  Canaan,  it  was  of  peculiar  importance 
that  they  should  be  informed  that  the  people  whose  country 
the  Lord  their  God  had  given  them  to  possess,  were  under  a 
curse  from  the  days  of  their  peculiar  prime  ancestor.  This 
being  so,  it  might  be  considered  unnecessary  to  suppose 
Canaan  to  have  been  at  the  time  even  born.  Consequently 
the  occurrence  which  we  are  about  to  relate,  and  drop  a  few 
words  of  comment  upon,  might  have  transpired  sooner  after 
the  egression  of  the  Noachic  family  from  their  confinement, 
than  the  period  we  a  moment  since  stated.  Yet  we,  on  the 
whole,  prefer  the  former  view,  it  seeming  to  us  to  have  more 
of  the  air  of  probability. 

The  incident,  or  rather  series  of  incidents,  related  in  Gen. 
9 :  20-24,  are  there  exhibited  in  so  plain  terms  as  that  no 
comment  can  perhaps  lead  to  a  better  understanding  of  their 
character  than  is  to  be  obtained  from  the  bare  record  itself, — 
except  possibly  in  regard  to  one  particular.  There  has  been 
some  difference  of  opinion  concerning  the  precise  import  of 
the  words,  "  He  drank  of  the  wine  and  was  drunken."  If  by 
the  wine  spoken  of  is  meant  the  unfermented  juice  of  the 
grape,  then  the  word  "  drunken "  would  no  more  indicate 
inebriant  excess,  than,  in  the  account  relative  to  the  miracle 
performed  by  our  Saviour  at  Cana  in  Galilee,  the  words, 
"  when  men  have  well  drunk,"  denote,  when  men  have  become 
well  intoxicated.  Noah's  act  would  then  be  rather  one  of 
surfeit  than  of  ebriety ;  of  surfeit  disposing,  like  excessive 
eating,  to  sleep.  If  the  wine  of  which  this  patriarch  par- 
took was  fermented,  and  so  possessed  inebriating  qualities,  it 


282  THE    ALLEGED    SIN    OF    THE    PATRIARCH. 

may  still  be  inquired  whether  the  word  drunken  denotes 
being  affected  to  intoxication,  or  merely  to  somewhat  beyond 
innocent  satiety.  Or,  again :  if  by  this  language  Noah  is  to 
be  understood  to  have  been  actually  overcome  by  the  wine's 
stimulating  properties,  the  question  may  arise,  whether  he 
was,  at  the  time  he  partook,  so  unacquainted  with  this  sort  of 
liquor,  or  of  the  strength  of  that  in  particular  of  which  he 
drank,  as  to  reduce  his  act  to  one  of  ignorance  or  inad- 
vertence. Viewing  the  deed  of  this  man  in  its  worst  light, 
he  fell  into  sin,  a  grievous  sin.  We  then  have  an  account  of 
the  melancholy  fall  into  sin  of  a  man  who  had  been,  in  the 
eyes  of  the  Omniscient  Deity  himself,  for  a  long  time  very 
eminent  for  piety;  and  there  comes  from  the  mournful 
occurrence  a  note  of  warning,  "  Let  him  that  thinketh  he 
standeth  take  heed  lest  he  fall."  It  is  our  wish  to  do  no 
injustice  to  our  patriarch,  on  the  one  hand,  by  -bringing  a 
heavy  charge  positively  against  him,  since  except  the  bare 
language  which  we  have  quoted,  there  is  no  other,  not  a  word, 
from  which  we  can  possibly  gather  that  he  had  been  guilty  of 
a  culpable  slip  here.  On  the  other  hand  we  would  not  be 
willing  to  offer  a  word  apologetic  of  an  act  of  sin,  whether  it 
be  a  sin  of  the  greatest  saint  or  of  the  smallest.  If  Noah  on 
this  occasion  was  indeed  intoxicated,  he  would,  were  he  here, 
thank  no  one  for  turning  apologist  for  him.  As  a  man  of 
God  he  would  attempt  no  apology  for  himself.  Instead  of 
trying  to  extenuate  his  offence,  he,  in  brokenness  of  spirit, 
and  humbled  in  the  dust,  would  rather  cry,  "  God  be  merciful 
to  me  a  sinner."  If  our  second  father  did  fall  by  an  act  of 
intemperance,  it  is  the  only  act  of  the  kind  which  we  have 
any  ground  for  imagining  he  ever  fell  into.  And  supposing 
our  postdiluvian  progenitor's  act  to  have  been  in  criminality 
all  that  the  severest  interpretation  of  the  Mosaic  narration 
can  make  it,  is  not  then  our  confidence  in  the  strict  and  un- 
swerving veracity  of  the  narrator  enhanced,  as  well  as  our 
idea  of  the  eminent  excellence  in  general  of  our  worthy 


THE    ALLEGED    SIN    OF    THE    PATRIARCH.  283 

patriarch's  character,  when  we  see  that  narrator  not  refrain- 
ing from  the  unapologetic  mention  of  a  fault  in  an  individual 
whom  he  is  describing,  when  he  finds  one,  and  when  there  is 
but  one  faulty  deed  to  be  discovered,  of  which  to  make 
mention  ? 


EVENING    TWENTY-SECOND. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

If  you  will  look  at  the  twenty-second  and  twenty-third 
verses  of  the  ninth  chapter  of  Genesis,  you  will,  in  the  differ- 
ence of  conduct  of  the  three  sons  of  Noah,  in  the  case  there 
stated,  witness  the  exemplification  of  a  truth  in  support  of 
which  we  have  been  afforded  many^more  recent  examples ; 
and  that  is,  what  a  striking  difference  there  may  be  in  the 
character  and  conduct  of  members  of  the  same  household, 
children  of  the  same  parents  ;  brought  up  or  nurtured  under 
like  circumstances  ;  enjoying  similar  intellectual,  social,  and 
moral  advantages.  With  wonder  it  may  be  asked,  How 
comes  it  ?  Why  is  it  so  ?  If  we  are  not  Hamites  in  our 
character,  let  us  listen  with  proper  feeling  to  the  interrogato- 
ries, "  Who  maketh  thee  to  differ  ?  and  what  hast  thou  that 
thou  didst  not  receive  ?  "  The  worst  characters  and  the  best 
sometimes  issue  from  the  same  domicile,  are  nourished  at  the 
same  breast.  Ham  had  been  highly  favored  ;  had  been  pre- 
served as  a  favorite  in  the  ark  from  the  overflowing  Flood  ; 
and  for  this  preservation  he  was  peculiarly,  eminently  in- 
debted, under  God,  to  his  father.  And  what  requital  does 
he  make  ?  They  who  are  under  obligations  to  be  the  most, 
are  sometimes  the  least  grateful.  The  want  of  filial  grati- 
tude and  filial  reverence  —  what  a  deficiency !  Even  the 
failings  of  a  father,  instead  of  being  proclaimed  as  from  the 


CARPINGS    OP   SKEPTICISM.  285 

house-top,  should  not  be  even  so  much  as  whispered  in 
secret ;  instead  of  being  wantonly  exposed,  or  made  the  sub- 
ject of  jeer  or  merriment,  should  be  studiously  concealed 
from  the  gaze  of  all,  and  give  rise  to  compassionate  and 
tearful  concern.  How  many  are  saved  by  the  mercy  of 
Heaven  from  sin  ;  how  many,  as  in  the  case  of  Ham,  to  sin  ! 
So  it  turns  out,  though  not  in  the  latter  case  so  intended. 
How  utter  a  failure  prove  all  attempts  to  find  language  ade- 
quate to  express  our  souFs  abhorrence  of  the  conduct  of  this 
son ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  our  admiring  appreciation  of 
the  superlatively  delicate  and  reverential  feelings  and  deport- 
ment, toward  their  exposed  sire,  of  Shem  and  Japheth ! 

And  what  incident  does  the  narrative  next  present  to  our 
inspection?  Will  you  have  the  goodness,  young  gentlemen, 
to  examine  thoroughly  the  paragraph  embraced  in  verses 
twenty-five  to  twenty-seven.  How  are  those  words  to  be 
regarded,  as  to  character  and  purport  ?  Men  of  anti-biblical 
prejudices,  if  their  minds  are  at  all  active,  may  probably  find 
something  here,  taken  in  connection  with  the  contents  of  the 
paragraph  immediately  preceding,  to  carp  at :  —  "  Ah,  this 
saint,  Noah,  wakes  from  his  cups,  quite  crusty.  No  sooner 
do  the  fumes  of  his  excess  a  little  evaporate,  than,  ascertain- 
ing what  a  plight  he  has  been  in  —  what  a  shameful  exposure 
of  his  person  has  accompanied  his  drunken  stupor ;  the 
amusement  which  it  has  afforded  to  one  of  his  sons,  and  the 
tender  thoughtfulness  and  delicate  concern  and  conduct  of  his 
two  others ;  —  their  solicitude  to  preserve  his  name  from 
reproach,  and  spare  his  sensibilities  —  he  begins,  as  one 
perfectly  beside  himself,  to  hurl  forth  his  curses  against  poor 
Ham,  not  sparing  even  Ham's  innocent  son,  Canaan,  from 
his  maledictive  ebullitions  ;  —  whilst,  as  if  to  carry  his  spleen 
still  father  against  this  his  amused  son,  he,  on  the  opposite 
hand,  flatters  and  pours  out  copious  benedictions  on  those 
who  had  pitied  his  weakness,  and  tried  to  throw  a  mantle 
over  his  name  as  well  as  his  nudity."  Do  not  imagine  that 
13* 


286  THE   PATRIARCH'S  PREDICTIONS. 

we  have  done  antibiblists  injustice  by  putting  into  their 
mouths  this  language.  Such  is  the  spirit  of  which  they  oft 
evince  the  possession,  as  to  convince  us  that  if  your  ears  heard 
\vhat  they  would  have  to  say  about  such  a  matter,  you  would 
think  that  our  picture  is  by  no  means  overdrawn. 

Well,  you  may  say,  what  have  you  to  offer  in  reply  to  the 
carpings,  if  such  they  be,  of  these  men  ?  —  Offer  ?  why,  they, 
in  my  view,  as  in  everything  else  with  which  the  Bible  has 
to  do,  greatly  misrepresent  the  case.  In  the  first  place  —  as 
to  the  character  of  what  on  this  occasion  was  uttered  by  our 
postdiluvian  ancestor,  events  have  clearly  shown  it  to  be  of 
the  nature  of  a  prediction,  as  to  all  whose  names  are  speci- 
fied, or  rather  the  descendants  of  them  respectively  whom 
they  represent.  Yes,  it  was  naught  other  than  a  prediction 
—  and  a  remarkable  one  it  was  —  true  in  every  iota,  —  as  the 
progress  of  time,  and  the  occurrences  accompanying  its  pro- 
gress, have  demonstrated  beyond  all  rational  doubt.  Young 
as  you  are  in  years,  you  are  not  to  be  presumed  such  perfect 
strangers  to  history  as  not  to  be  assured  of  this.  "What,  for 
instance,  does  history  testify  concerning  the  character  and 
consequent  fate  of  large  portions  of  Canaan's  descendants  ? 
What,  moreover,  respecting  various  other  lines  of  Plain's 
posterity  ?  Read  the  words,  "  A  servant  of  servants  shall 
he  be  unto  his  brethren !  "  This,  though  said  directly  in  re- 
gard to  Canaan's  posterity,  yet  is  to  be  considered  inclu- 
sive of  Ham's  descendants  in  the  other  branches,  Canaan,  as 
being  prominent,  representing  the  whole,  as  Ephraim,  for 
the  same  cause,  is,  in  the  sacred  records,  not  unfrequently 
found  used  to  indicate  the  ten  tribes.  Now  compare  this 
strong  language  "  a  servant  of  servants,"  with  what  is  known 
to  have  been  largely  the  fate  of  the  African  population,  de- 
scendants of  Ham.  The  phrase  just  named  is  a  Hebraic 
idiom,  conveying  a  superlative  idea :  a  servant  reduced  to 
the  lowest  degree  of  servitude  or  degradation.  It  is  specifi- 


THE   PATRIARCH'S   PREDICTIONS.  287 

cally  predicted,  you  observe,  that  Canaan  shall  be  a  servant 
to  both  Shem  and  Japheth,  i.  e.  that  Ham's  progeny  shall 
occupy  a  position  of  inferiority  and  subserviency  to  Shem's 
and  Japheth's  descendants.  How  signally  fulfilled !  You 
find  it  foretold  that  the  Lord  would  be  specially  the  ts  God  of 
Shem,"  (26th  verse.)  This  is  the  first  instance  in  Holy 
Writ  of  the  Infinite  One  being  called  the  God  of  any  special 
person  or  persons  :  a  testimony  to  Shem's  exemplary  piety, 
(not  forgetting  its  application  to  his  posterity,)  and  God's 
condescending  goodness.  You  will  discern  a  verification  of 
what  is  here  foretold,  by  recognizing  the  fact  that  Shem  was 
the  ancestor  of  the  Messiah,  and  the  progenitor  of  the  Jews. 
The  "  enlargement  of  Japheth"  is  predicted.  Behold  it  veri- 
fied :  the  whole  of  Europe  ;  a  considerable  part  of  Asia ; 
and  an  eminently  large  proportion  of  America,  have  been 
peopled  and  are  occupied  by  Japheth's  offspring.  It  is  like- 
wise foretold  of  Japheth,  that  he  should  "  dwell  in  the  tents 
of  Shem:"  that  is,  that  Japheth's  descendants  should  be- 
come participators  in  the  choice  spiritual  privileges,  or  moral 
and  religious  advantages,  vouchsafed  to  the  Shemites,  in  par- 
ticular allusion  to  those  of  the  Hebrews  ;  and,  as  it  may  be 
understood,  dwell  at  length,  and  for  a  considerable  season,  in 
the  tents  of  the  Shemites,  to  the  exclusion  of  the  latter :  veri- 
fied or  fulfilled  in  the  rejection  of  the  Jews,  and  the  adoption 
of  the  Japhetic  Gentiles  in  their  room. 

In  regard  to  the  insinuation  of  Noah's  cursing  Canaan 
though  innocent,  it  may  be  observed,  first,  that  the  Jewish 
doctors  have  been  generally  of  the  opinion  that  Canaan  was 
not  only  a  partner  with  his  father  in  the  offence,  but  a  leader 
in  it.  In  the  next  place,  interpreting  the  language  of  our 
patriarch  in  reference  to  Ham  or  Canaan,  as  well  as  in  rela- 
tion to  Shem  and  Japheth  —  i.  e.  the  descendants  of  each, —  as 
predictive,  what  then  becomes  of  the  charge  implying  injus- 
tice ?  Prediction  is  surely  not  to  be  identified  or  confounded 
witli  causation.  The  foretelling  of  an  event  does  not  cause 


288  AT    WHAT    TIME    UTTERED. 

it.     This  is  so  with  regard  to  predictions  relating  both  to 
good  and  ill,  and  equally  so  with  the  one  as  with  the  other. 
Noah  had  no  direct  or  special  agency  in  bringing  evil  on 
Ham's  offspring,  nor  good  on  the  offspring  of   Shem  and 
Japheth ;  nor  did  Noah  entertain  any  idea,  when  he  gave 
utterance  to  the  language  under  consideration,  that  he  was 
himself,  at  the  time,  fixing  or  affecting  the  destiny  of  any 
portion  of  his  either  proximate  or  remote  descendants.     He 
was  neither  so  quixotic  nor  idiotic  as  to  imagine  his  words  to 
be,  in  their  nature  or  their  influence,  causative ;  as  to  harbor 
the  notion,  or  have  the  shadow  of  it  float  across  his  brain, 
that  he  was  pouring  out  blessings  or  curses  that  should  take 
effect  as  coming  from  his  lips.     Nor  are  we  to  contemplate 
him  here  as  even  giving  expression  to  personal  desires  or 
private  wishes  in  relation  to  the  progeny,  near  or  remote,  of 
any  of  his  sons.     Lastly,  on  this  topic  :  Nor  —  if  the  insinu- 
ation merit  the  shadow  of  a  notice  —  was  Noah,  by  either 
the  good  or  bad  influence  of  the  wine  he  drank,  aided  in 
prophesying  after  the  manner  he  did :    For  though  the  nar- 
rative of  what  he  uttered,  and  the  narrative  of  what  he  ante- 
cedently did,  are  put  by  the  historian  in  remarkable  juxta- 
position, yet  this  may  have  been  the  result,  solely,  of  desire 
with   the  narrator   to  consult  brevity,  and  not  at   all  from 
proximity  as  to  time  in  the  occurrence  of  the  two  :  instances 
of  similar  nature  occurring  elsewhere  in  sacred  history  from 
such  a  cause.     We  are  of  the  opinion,  and  are  not  alone  in 
it,  that  a  considerable  season  intervened  between  our  patri- 
arch's two  acts  of  wine-drinking  and  prophesying.     But,  if 
the  drinking  of  the  wine  and  the  prophesying  did  occur  the 
one  very  shortly  after  the  other  —  what  then  ?     Why,  we 
think  in  that  case  there  is  good  ground  for  inferring  that 
Noah's  act  of  wine-drinking  was  not  of  that  culpable  nature 
—  was  not  followed  with  such  an  effect  —  as  that  the  one 
thing  could  not  with  propriety  or  consistency  follow  speedily 
the  other.     We  shall  then  believe  the  following  view,  from 


NAMES  OF  THE  THREE  SONS  PROPHETIC.      289 

the  pen  of  Dr.  J.  Pye  Smith,  to  be  about  the  correct  one :  — 
"  The  vine  had  existed  before  the  flood,  and  Noah  could  not 
be  unacquainted  with  it ;  but  not  till  now  had  grapes  been 
grown  of  such  size,  sweetness,  and  abundance  of  juice,  as  to 
strike  out  the  thought  of  expressing  that  juice,  and  reserving 
it  in  a  vessel  for  future  use.  Noah,  we  think  it  probable, 
knew  not  that  in  a  few  days  it  would  ferment  and  acquire 
new  and  surprising  properties.  Innocently  and  without 
suspicion  he  drunk  of  the  alluring  beverage,  as  if  it  had 
been  water  from  the  spring.  The  consequence  is  recorded 
in  the  characteristic  simplicity  of  style  which  affirms  neither 
censure  nor  apology.  We  regard  that  consequence  as  not  a 
sinful  intoxication,  both  from  what  was  probably  the  occa- 
sional cause,  and  from  the  immediate  agency  of  the  Spirit  of 
God  in  communicating  prophecy.  The  latter  indeed  is  not 
an  impregnable  ground ;  for  bad  men  might  receive  gifts  of 
inspiration,  as  Balaam  and  Judas ;  but  Noah  was  eminently 
a  righteous  and  perfect  man,  and  it  is  inconceivable  that  a 
miraculous  influence  of  God  should  be  granted  in  immediate 
contiguity  with  a  sinful  action."  (See  Kitto's  Cyc.,  Art. 
Noah.) 

Whilst  speaking  about  so  remarkable  a  manifestation  of  a 
prophetic  spirit,  on  the  part  of  our  patriarch,  in  regard  to  the 
coming  condition  or  destiny  of  his  three  sons  or  their  progeny 
severally,  we  should  not  omit  to  remark,  that  even  the  names 
borne  by  these  sons  seemed  themselves  prophetic ;  Shem  sig- 
nifying name,  as  if  pointing  to  some  marked  distinction  over 
his  brethren ;  Ham  denoting  heat,  as  if  indicating  the  cli- 
matic locality  to  be  occupied  by  his  posterity ;  and  the  im- 
port of  Japheth  being  enlargement,  as  if  betokening  the 
increase,  spread,  and  prosperity  of  his  offspring.  By  this 
explanation  you  are  at  once  reminded  of  the  striking  coinci- 
dence between  the  purport  of  these  names  severally,  and 
that  of  the  prophecy,  relatively,  on  which  we  have  been 
commenting. 


290  ADVANTAGES    FROM   THE   PAST. 

Mention  was,  a  short  time  since,  made  of  the  resumption 
by  Noah  of  the  art  of  husbandry  —  knowledge  and  experi- 
ence in  regard  to  which  the  great  builder  and  navigator  had 
acquired  the  other  side  of  the  waste  of  waters.  This  knowl- 
edge and  experience,  attained  in  earlier  life,  and  which  were 
among  the  few  useful  relics  which  the  flood  had  not  destroyed, 
would  be  eminently  in  requisition  in  the  new  era :  a  world  of 
desolation  being  spread  out  before  the  Noachidce,  and  much 
of  the  means  of  subsistence  having  necessarily  to  be  extorted 
from  the  soil  by  cultivation.  And  that  attempts  to  cultivate 
the  now  new  surface  of  the  earth  would  not  be  altogether 
fruitless,  the  inchoate  verdure,  on  every  hand  exhibiting  it- 
self, would  be  suited  to  afford  encouraging  and  stimulating 
intimations.  Advantages,  moreover,  great  and  invaluable 
for  the  prosecution  of  agriculture,  that  noble  and  indispensable 
calling,  might  and  doubtless  were  derived,  by  his  near  and 
more  distant  offspring,  from  the  instructions,  oral  and  practi- 
cal, of  this  once  antediluvian  and  now  postdiluvian  husband- 
man. 

Nor,  so  far  as  relates  to  industrial  and  necessary  pursuits, 
was  it  in  agriculture,  solely,  that  the  cisdiluvian  inherited  or 
derived  essential  benefits  from  the  transdiluvian  world.  A 
knowledge  of  the  main  or  more  useful  mechanic  arts  found, 
in  the  duomundane  family,  a  medium  of  descent  from  a 
former  age  to  the  ages  succeeding  the  great  catastrophe. 
An  acquaintance  with  architecture,  among  others,  thus  found 
a  channel  of  transmission  to  the  various  lines  and  genera- 
tions of  the  postdiluvian  population.  You  can  at  least  faint- 
ly imagine  how  important  to  the  convenience  and  comfort  of 
the  earth's  new  denizens,  must  have  been  the  inheritance  of 
a  knowledge  of  this  art,  —  all  the  previous  works  of  man, 
edifices  to  occupy  with  the  rest,  having  one  and  all,  by  the 
great  besom,  been  swept  from  the  globe.  Even  the  experi- 
ence and  practical  facility,  architecturally,  which  Noah  and 
his  sons  had  acquired  or  increased  in  the  erection  of  the  ark 


"THE  SEVEN  PRECEPTS."  291 

itself,  would  thus  be  made  to  tell  advantageously  on  the  con- 
veniences and  comforts  of  the  New  World.  On  the  whole, 
then,  it  was  comparatively  under  quite  favorable  auspices 
that  the  postdiluvian  population  commenced  and  pursued 
their  career.  The  elements  of  temporal  weal  or  worldly 
prosperity  were  not  wanting ;  had  floated  down  to  them  in 
the  strange  flat-bottomed  but  capacious  boat  which  came 
from  "  the  world  beyond  the  flood." 

But  this,  young  gentlemen,  is  not  all.  Advantages  other 
than  those  connected  with  secular  science  and  art  came  over 
the  waters  which  rolled  between  the  Old  and  the  New  World. 
Great  moral  truths  and  lessons,  for  the  regulation  of  the 
heart  and  life,  came  to  the  cisdiluvian  generations  from  a 
world  which  had  been,  but  now  was  not:  truths  and, lessons 
for  creatures  standing  in  important  relations  to  God ;  creatures 
accountable  and  immortal.  What  kind  and  measure  of 
influence  these  great  truths  and  lessons  had  on  those  por- 
tions of  the  biseval  patriarch's  posterity  which  came  into 
existence  during  his  subsequent  lifetime,  we  may  be  afforded 
some  little  glimpse  of  in  the  further  survey  of  "  his  Times." 
Some  developments,  ere  we  are  done,  will,  in  all  proba- 
bility, heave  upon  our  mental  vision. 

It  will  not  be  accounted  amiss  for  us  just  to  make  mention 
of  an  old  tradition  of  the  Rabbinical  Hebrews,  on  which  too 
they  lay  great  stress,  that  at  this  juncture  our  worthy 
patriarch  delivered  to  his  children  seven  precepts,  to  be 
enjoined  on  all  their  descendants.  These  inhibit,  first,  Idol- 
atry; second,  Irreverence  to  the  Deity;  third,  Homicide; 
fourth,  Unchastity ;  fifth,  Fraud  and  Plundering ;  the  sixth 
enjoins  Government  and  Obedience  ;  and  the  seventh  inter- 
dicts the  eating  of  any  part  of  an  animal  still  living.  These 
precepts  have,  by  Mr.  Selden,  been  largely  illustrated,  and 
are  regarded  by  this  writer  as  a  concise  tablet  of  the  Law  of 
Nature.  (See  his  De  Jure  Nat.  et  Gent,  juxta  Disciplin. 


292  APPROACH    TO    A    NEW   ERA. 

Ebrseorum.)  Though  no  positive  evidence  is  possessed  by 
us  of  their  having  been  formally  enjoined  upon  our  respected 
postdiluvian  father,  perhaps  there  can  be  found  no  decisive 
reason  for  rejecting  such  a  hypothesis. 

We  have  now  arrived  at  a  point  in  the  Mosaic  annals 
where  a  hasty  or  careless  reader  might  be  betrayed  into  the 
idea  that  Noah  here  ended  his  days, — -  the  ninth  chapter  of 
Genesis  closing  with  the  announcement  of  his  death.  In  this 
matter  the  sacred  historian  was  evidently  more  controlled  by 
some  other  consideration  than  that  relating  to  chronological 
order ;  since,  according  to  the  Hebrew  Chronology,  which  for 
obvious  reasons  we  are  following  in  these  Exercises,  the  place, 
chronologically,  for  this  record,  would  be  toward  the  end  of 
the  eleventh  chapter,  —  immediately  preceding  the  record  of 
the  birth  of  Abraham.  There  is  a  similar  disregard  of  chrono- 
logical order  in  this  historian's  recitals  —  we  speak  not  of  it 
complainingly  —  God  forbid  that  we  should  —  in  other  in- 
stances. In  reference  to  Abraham  himself  this  is  so ;  who 
lived  until  his  grandson,  Jacob,  was  a  lad  of  fifteen,  and  yet 
there  is  mention  made  of  his  decease  some  time  antecedent 
to  the  record  of  the  birth  of  the  latter. 

Just  as  there  are  persons  who  can  stand  on  the  margin 
of  a  broad  and  majestic  river  without  having  any  inquisitive 
desire  excited  to  learn  where  its  waters  rise  and  whither  they 
empty  themselves :  or  enter  a  city  and  leave  it  without  any 
interest  being  kindled  in  their  minds,  respecting  its  origin  or 
its  prospects ;  or  can  look  up  into  the  blue  and  begemmed 
heavens,  or  abroad  upon  the  wide  domains  of  nature,  with 
scarcely  more  of  the  spirit  of  inquiry,  or  feeling  of  interest, 
than  creatures  sub-human  manifest,  —  so  may  there  be  found 
readers  of  the  sacred  annals,  who  will  glance  over  the 
tenth  and  eleventh  chapters  of  Genesis,  without  experi- 
encing any  lively  interest,  and  certainly  without  an  intellect 
roused  to  intense  inquisitiveness.  And  yet  here  are  the 
historic  elements  of  truly  great  and  wondrous  facts.  Here 


INCREASE    OP   NUMBERS.  293 

are  the  records  of  the  inceptions  of  what  have  swollen  into 
many  and  mighty  things,  —  of  the  rise  of  no  less  than  all  the 
various  languages  and  nations  of  the  earth.     Brief  and  frag- 
mentary as  are  the  limits  comprised  in  the  two  chapters  just 
named,  inquiries  regarding  them  will  not,  we  are  persuaded? 
be  prosecuted  with  indifference  by  such  minds  as  are  ad- 
dressed in  these  lectures.     Yet,  lest  you  should  feel  disap- 
pointment, it  may  not  be  amiss  to  have  you  apprised  that  our 
path  will  not  be  one  exempt  from  obstructions  or  obscurities ; 
that  scarcely  any  part  of  it,  as  we  travel  onward,  will  we  find 
irradiated  and  gilded  by  blazing,  brilliant  sunlight;  whilst 
here  and  there,  in   instances  not  infrequent,  shall  we   be 
necessitated  to  feel  our  way,  where  our  eyes  will  afford  little 
assistance,  and  where  we   shall  be  exceedingly  perplexed 
with  hesitancy    just  what  course  to  take.     None,  we   are 
sure,  but  a  dogmatist  of  the  most  gigantic  and  rigid  type,  of 
what  we  might  call  the  "  first  water,"  will  be  able  to  traverse 
these  forests  and  both  feel  and  maintain  that  he  is  always 
right.     It  will  indeed  be  our  aim  here  and  there  to  present 
more  than  one  view  which  has  been  or  may  be  taken  concern- 
ing  one  Bnd   another   point   inviting  inquiry   or   soliciting 
notice.     You  must  not,  in  the  prosecution  of  our  further 
inquiries,  be  surprised  to  find  little  direct  mention  made  of 
our  patriarch  —  not  because,  however,  we  shall  have  travelled 
beyond  "  his  Times,"  that  is,  if  the  Hebrew  computation  be 
correct  —  which  we  are  not  disposed  here  either  to  affirm  or 
deny,  yet  proceeding  on  the  assumption  at  present  of  its  cor- 
rectness ;  but  because,  treading  in  the  footprints  of  the  archaic 
annalist,  we  are  led  to  the  contemplation  of  objects  and 
events  with  which  his  contemporary  progeny  had,  apparently, 
to  say  the  least,  much  more  to  do  than  himself. 

Not  unobservant  of  the  injunction  or  counsel  to  "be  fruit- 
ful and  multiply  "  and  thus  haste  to  "  replenish  "  the  depopu- 
lated earth,  the  three  sons  of  Noah  had  scarcely  sooner  left 
the  ark,  than  they  began  to  have  children  born  to  them.  Of 


294  INCREASE    OF    NUMBERS. 

this  the  record  gives  specific  intimation  where  it  makes 
mention  (chapter  11 :  10)  of  the  birth  of  Shem's  son  Ar- 
phaxad  occurring  "  two  years  after  the  Flood."  As  you,  in 
anticipation  of  each  Evening's  Exercise,  probably  peruse 
beforehand  such  portions  of  the  Mosaic  records  as  are  likely 
to  come  next  under  examination,  it  will  hardly  be  requisite  to 
request  you  to  refresh  your  memory  with  the  contents  of  the 
tenth  chapter  of  the  first  book  of  the  Pentateuch.  Yet 
as  you  have  the  sacred  volume  spread  open  before  you,  it 
will  not  be  useless  to  cast  your  eye  over  the  names  of  those 
descendants  of  Noah's  three  sons,  there  given,  who  were  born 
within  a  century  after  the  deluge,  and  to  mark  them  not  only 
as  names  standing  at  the  heads  of  lines,  but  as  furnishing  a 
clue  by  which  to  arrive  at  some  at  least  vague  conjecture 
what  number  of  descendants  Noah  could  count  up  at  that 
century's  close.  It  is  simply  in  the  light  of  a  genealogical 
list  that  we  ask  you  now  to  look  at  it.  On  some  future  occa- 
sion we  shall  recall  your  attention  to  and  request  you  to  con- 
template and  inspect  it  as  an  interesting  and  exceedingly  im- 
portant ethnological  document.  It  was  no  part  of  the  business 
of  the  first  postdiluvian  century  actually  to  form  or  organ- 
ize nations,  but  rather  to  take  the  prerequisite  steps  toward 
it  —  to  produce  and  shape  the  suitable  materials  out  of  which 
those  larger  associational  institutions  might  afterward  be 
formed.  Nations,  as  such,  of  necessity  had  no  existence  until 
after  the  first  one  hundred  years  had  taken  their  station  with 
the  years  beyond  the  flood.  But  —  as  will  on  inspection  be 
discovered  —  it  being  in  a  dispersed  and  incipiently  national 
capacity  that  a  considerable  portion  of  the  tenth  chapter  sets 
forth  the  peoples  of  whom  it  speaks,  we  are  led,  first  in  order 
of  time,  to  examine  those  records,  in  the  eleventh  chapter, 
giving  intimations  of  events  which  obviously,  from  their  very 
nature,  must  have  preceded  more  or  less  regular  and  wide- 
spread national  organizations. 


EVENING    TWENTY-THIRD. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN  : 

Just  how  numerous,  at  the  close  of  the  first  century  after 
the  flood,  the  postdiluvians  had  become,  the  brief  genealogical 
roll  contained  in  the  tenth  chapter  of  Genesis  does  not  afford 
us  the  requisite  data  for  determining.  We  can,  in  general 
terms,  safely  affirm  that  our  patriarch's  descendants  must 
by  this  time  have  swollen  to  very  considerable  numbers. 
Prompted  not  only  by  near  relationship  and  social  disposition, 
but  by  regard  to  safety  and  protection  from  the  rage  and 
voracity  of  wild  beasts,  they  would  continue  to  reside 
in  as  immediate  propinquity  as  the  facilities  essential  for 
securing  a  subsistence  would  allow.  Yet  they  may  not 
have  continued  to  the  utmost  degree  stationary.  A  little  of 
a  migratory  course  might,  after  a  while,  have  been  adopted 
by  them,  so  far  as  agricultural  operations,  to  which  we  have 
seen  them  early  to  have  turned  their  attention,  would  at  all 
admit.  Particularly  is  it  supposable  that  they  would  gradu- 
ally extend  their  settlements  from  less  to  more  fertile  and 
salubrious  localities ;  and  their  progressively  augmenting 
numbers  would  likewise  necessarily  lead  to  the  enlargement, 
year  by  year,  of  the  area  which  they  would  occupy.  An 
acquaintance  with  what  pertained  to  life's  greater  con- 
veniences and  comforts  would,  as  their  observation  and 
experience  extended,  acquire  progressive  enlargement.  They 


296  THE   LAND    OF    SHINAR    ENTERED. 

would  be  thus  stimulated  to  push  their  investigations  and 
discoveries  still  farther;  to  penetrate  hitherto  unoccupied 
regions ;  until  at  length  having  ascertained  that  within  an 
attainable  distance  lay  a  broad,  promisingly  fertile  and  well- 
watered  domain,  unbroken  by  lofty  and  rocky  eminences, 
or  wide  and  malarious  morasses  —  more  or  less  of  them, 
we  shall  not  at  present  attempt  to  say  how  many,  began  to 
be  moved  by  an  irrepressible  anxiety  to  enter  upon  its  oc- 
cupation ;  whilst  a  few  at  least,  perhaps,  actuated  by  impulses 
less  justifiable,  incentives  less  commendable,  might  set  them- 
selves to  excogitate  and  mature  the  plans  for  effecting  an 
eligible  and  speedy  removal  to,  and  proprietary  occupancy 
of,  the  vast  and  extraordinarily  inviting  territory. 

Every  arrangement  made,  they  enter  this  land,  denominated 
TpB  Shinar,  the  same  in  general  which  bore  afterward  the 
name  of  Babylonia  —  so  called  from  the  name  of  its  chief 
city,  Babylon,  the  origin  of  which  will  soon  be  seen.  This 
country  likewise  bore  subsequently  the  name  of  Chaldea.  Its 
boundaries,  indeed,  were  for  some  time  not  very  determinate. 
In  a  restricted  sense,  Shinar  was  that  province  of  Asia, 
bordered  on  the  north  by  a  portion  of  Mesopotamia ;  on  the 
east  by  the  Tigris ;  on  the  south  by  the  Persian  gulf;  and  on 
the  west  or  southwest  by  the  Arabian  desert.  In  a  larger 
or  more  general  sense,  it  designated  that  vast  plain  watered 
by  the  Euphrates  and  the  Tigris.  The  particular  locality 
selected  and  primarily  settled  on  by  the  immigrants,  seems  to 
have  been  that  embracing  what  subsequently  became  the  site 
and  vicinity  of  the  city  of  Babylon. 

This  district  you  find  them  approaching  and  entering  "from 
the  east."  (Ch.  11:2.)  This  phraseology  we  wish  you  par- 
ticularly to  note.  Had  the  lofty  peak  of  Agridagh  in  Armenia 
been  the  spot  where  the  ark  stranded  or  finally  settled  —  had 
it  been  near  the  foot  of  that  proudly  towering  eminence 
where,  according  to  a  very  common  idea,  the  Noachian  family 


THE   PHRASE   "FROM   THE    EAST"    CONSIDERED.       297 

first  located  themselves  after  their  egress  from  the  floating 
vessel,  and  from  which  the  land  of  Shinar  is  to  be  considered 
as  having  been  approached,  the  language  of  the  historian 
should  have  then  run :  "  As  they  journeyed  from  the  north  " 
—  such  being  the  direction  from  Shinar,  or  Babylonia,  of  the 
locality  just  mentioned.  To  obviate  this  difficulty,  some 
indeed  have  essayed  to  give  to  the  original  (Dllpfa  mikkedem) 
the  rendering  of  "to  the  east"  —  "ad  orientem,  vel  orientem 
versus,"  (see  Drusus  in  loco,  and  Fuller ;  Miscel.  Sac.  Liber 
1,  ch.  4,)  —  or  eastward,  as  in  Genesis  13:  11.  We  cannot 
adopt  this  rendering ;  our  version,  obviously,  according  to  our 
view,  presenting  the  correct  translation  of  the  original.  You 
remember  the  argument  we,  a  few  evenings  since,  (see  Even- 
ings Fifteenth  and  Sixteenth,)  presented  in  opposition  to  the 
idea,  that  the  Agridagh  was  the  locality  where  the  ark  of  Noah 
finally  rested,  and  whence  the  eight  souls  proceeded  to  re-settle 
the  earth.  We  would  now,  in  addition,  urge  this  :  That  not 
from  the  north  —  and  Mount  Agridagh  lay  far  northward  — 
but  "  from  the  east"  Shinar  was  approached.  As  the  vicinity 
of  Agridagh  may  be  supposed,  moreover,  on  account  of  its 
climate,  to  afford  a  very  unsuitable  spot  for  the  planting  of  a 
vineyard,  and  as  our  patriarch,  as  we  have  seen,  soon  turned 
his  attention  in  part  that  way,  it  may  from  this  circumstance 
be  inferred  that  it  was  some  lower  latitude  where  the  floating 
house  finally  rested,  and  the  prime  postdiluvian  family  first 
selected  their  temporary  abode.  From  all  the  considerations 
which  have  been  presented,  it  would  not  at  all  surprise  us  to 
learn  that  you  have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  though 
the  ark  found,  for  a  while,  a  measure  of  repose  over  the 
—  not  mountain  —  no  such  definite  language  as  that  — 
"  mountains  of  Ararat,"  or  Armenia,  yet  it  afterward  floated 
to  a  more  southern  latitude ;  settling  finally  either  on  some 
part  of  the  mountain  range  running  between  Assyria  and 
Media,  Susiana  and  Persia,  or  else  on  one  or  the  other  side? 
probably  the  eastern,  of  said  range.  If  you  will  look  into 


98      ADDITIONAL  AS  TO  THE   ARK'S    RESTING  PLACE. 

Malte-Brun's  Geography,  vol.  2,  pages  99  and  108,  you  will 
find  the  following  remarks :  — "  The  Gordian  mountains  of 
Xenophon,  called  Corduene  in  the  map  of  d'Anville,  fill 
the  whole  of  Koordistan;  one  branch  prolonged  to  the  south 
is  the  Zagrus  (Zagros,  Gr.)  of  the  ancients,  which  separates 
the  Ottoman  empire  from  Persia.  —  According  to  the  Koords, 
Dgiondi  is  the  mountain  on  which  Noah's  ark  rested.  This 
is  within  the  Pashalic  of  Diarbekir,  and  not  far  from  Djezi- 
ra,  the  capital  of  a  principality,  the  inhabitants  of  which  are 
called  Bottani."  We  certainly  could  not  advise  you  to  be 
in  haste  about  coming  to  any  positive  and  unalterable  de- 
cision on  the  subject. 

Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  bearing  in  mind  what  the  Scripture 
says  relative  to  the  migration  of  the  Shinar  settlers  from  the 
east,  placed  the  mountain  where  he  supposed  the  ark  to  strand, 
much  farther  eastward  than  the  range  just  named,  —  "  near 
Scythia  and  Sogdiana  and  almost  as  far  as  the  East  Indies  " 
—  on  the  great  Caucasian  range,  somewhere  between  twenty 
and  thirty  degrees  eastward  from  Babylonia.  Mr.  Shuck- 
ford's  idea  appears  similar  to  this  last.  Taking  the  phrase 
"  mountains  of  Ararat "  to  indicate  that  extended  mountain 
range  running  from  Armenia  past  the  southern  end  of  the  Cas- 
pian far  eastward,  or  bearing  somewhat  to  the  south  of  east, 
he  advances  the  conjecture  that  the  ark  rested  finally  at  some 
spot  in  that  range  between  India  and  ancient  Scythia  (mod- 
ern Tartary).  And  it  must  be  confessed,  his  reasoning  has 
in  it  some  plausibility.  We  may  have  occasion,  after  a  short 
time,  to  speak  of  a  little  of  it.  Meanwhile,  should  you  find  it 
convenient,  look  into  his  Connections,  vol.  1,  pp.  99-104.  We 
will  just  say  here,  that  this  conjecture  of  Mr.  Shuckford  ap- 
pears pretty  strongly  objectionable  on  the  ground  that  the  dis- 
tance thence  to  Shinar,  being  not  less  than  from  1200  to 
1500  miles,  seems  unreasonably  great  for  the  Shinar  settlers, 
in  face  of  the  difficulties  and  dangers  at  that  early  period  neces- 
sarily to  be  surmounted,  to  undertake,  even  by  slow  marches, 


THE    VIEW    OF   ADELUNG.  299 

or  after  repeated  intervals  —  especially,  as  they  would  have 
no  incentive  to  such  an  enterprise  from  any  impracticability 
of  finding  an  extensive,  reasonably  fertile,  and  salubrious 
district  nearer.  Bedford  thinks  he  discovers,  about  nine 
degrees  east  from  Shinar,  a  mountain-bed  on  which  the  ark 
sunk  to  repose.  (See  his  Scripture  Chronology,  page  187.) 
The  exact  spot  it  is  manifestly  vain  to  attempt  to  ascertain. 
The  chief  reason  why  some  lofty  mountain  summit,  and  par- 
ticularly the  eminently  towering  peak  of  the  Agridagh,  has 
been,  by  so  many  interpreters,  imagined  to  be  the  place  of 
the  ark's  final  settlement,  has,  doubtless,  been  the  fancied 
necessity  imposed  on  them  of  understanding  Gen.  8 :  4,  as 
designating  such  place  of  ultimate  stranding.  But  if  Mr. 
Morren's  view,  to  which  we,  several  evenings  since,  (Even- 
ing Sixteenth,)  adverted,  be  correct,  it  is  not  necessary  to 
seek  for  any  preeminently  lofty  mountain  altitude,  nor  indeed 
any  mountain  range  at  'all,  for  the  ark's  final  resting-place,  — 
a  plain  serving  at  least  as  well,  —  since  Moses,  according  to 
that  interpretation,  makes  no  statement  concerning  this  point ; 
—  and  on  some  accounts,  certainly,  a  plain,  for  egress,  and 
making  arrangements  for  settlement,  even  though  temporary, 
would  be  considerably  more  convenient. 

We  cannot  resist  the  temptation  to  give  you  the  view  of 
Adelung,  respecting  the  locality  which  he  conceives  to  have 
been  occupied  by  man  in  the  dawn  of  his  being;  and,  if  he 
can  be  said  to  have  recognized  a  deluge,  the  part  of  the  globe 
which  more  or  less  of  the  Noachidae  left  when  they  "journeyed 
from  the  east "  to  Shinar.  It  was  that  lovely  land  separated 
by  mountains  from  India,  Persia  (in  its  larger  sense),  and 
Thibet  —  the  enchanting  valley  of  Cashmere.  Owing  to  its 
elevation,  the  heat  of  the  South  is  said  to  be  tempered  into 
a  perpetual  spring,  and  Nature  here  puts  forth  her  every 
power  to  bring  all  her  works,  plants,  animals,  and  man,  to 
the  highest  state  of  perfection.  At  his  first  creation,  man 
—  ere  by  time  and  experience  there  had  been  a  ripening  of 


300  DATE    OF    THE   MIGRATION    TO    SHINAR. 

his  faculties  —  required  an  abode  where  nature's  free  bounty 
would  supply  all  his  wants ;  in  fine,  he  needed,  with  reference 
even  to  his  mere  physical  necessities,  a  Paradise !  To  this 
appellation,  thought  Adelung,  no  country  in  Asia  can  assert 
a  better  claim  than  the  charming  land  of  Cashmere.  Even 
the  men  of  this  country  he  represents  as  distinguished,  among 
Asiatics,  by  superior  natural  endowments,  mental  and  physi- 
cal. They  have  none  of  the  Tartar  physiognomy,  but  exhibit 
the  features  of  the  European  race ;  while,  in  genius  and  intel- 
ligence, they  surpass  most  other  Oriental  nations.  Adelung's 
description  of  this  enchanting  country  calls  to  mind,  in  many 
of  its  features,  the  Happy  Valley  in  Rasselas. 

Among  the  arguments  adduced  in  support  of  Adelung's 
fanciful  idea,  as  plausible  a  one  as  any  appears  to  us  to  be, 
that  Cashmere  lies  in  a  direct  line,  as  may  be  seen  by  the 
map,  to  the  east  of  Shinar  or  Mesopotamia.  The  whole  in- 
tervening territory  is  occupied  by  the  Central  Asiatic  table 
land  of  Persia  or  Iran,  which,  in  general,  is  said  to  form  one 
continual  descent  from  its  highest  elevation  on  the  borders  of 
Cashmere  to  its  termination  near  the  plain  of  Shinar.  As 
to  Ar-ar-at,  Eitter  is  of  the  opinion  that  it  may  reasonably 
be  inferred  to  be  nothing  else  than  a  term  commonly  applied 
in  the  East  to  "  a  country  of  lofty  mountains,"  an  expression 
highly  appropriate  to  the  Persian  table  land,  both  at  its  centre, 
and  at  its  junction  with  the  Semitic  regions  near  the  banks 
of  the  Tigris  and  Euphrates.  With  this  idea  Sir  Win.  Jones 
at  least  so  far  accorded  as  to  be  confident  in  the  opinion  that 
after  the  deluge  the  place  of  settlement  of  mankind  was  Iran, 
which  was  the  proper  and  native  name  of  Persia  and  some 
connected  regions.  His  own  words  are,  "  The  human  family 
after  the  flood  established  themselves  in  the  northern  parts  of 
Iran."  (See  his  Works,  vol.  3,  pp.  191-196.) 

How  soon,  after  the  flood,  did  the  migration  to  Shinar 
take  place  ?  is  a  question  to  which  it  may  very  reason- 
ably be  supposed  you  would  desire  to  have  an  answer.  A 


WHAT    THE    NAME    "  PELEG  "    INDICATES.  301 

main  datum  for  the  [determination  of  this  point  has  been 
considered  to  be  afforded  by  the  archaic  historian  in  ch.  10 : 
25,  i.  e.,  in  the  name  Peleg,  which  signifies  division,  and  the 
reason  assigned  for  the  affixing  of  that  appellation,  to  wit, 
"  for  in  his  days  was  the  earth  divided ; "  in  allusion,  as  has 
been  very  commonly  thought,  to   the   Dispersion.     It  has 
indeed  been    questioned  by  some   respectable    philologists 
whether  the  name  Peleg  was  given  at  all  in  reference  to  such 
a  separation  of  mankind  as  the  dispersion.     They  have  been 
rather  inclined  to  think    that   the   event  which   singularly 
marked  Peleg's  life  was  an  occurrence  in  physical  geography 
—  an  earthquake  which  produced  a  vast  chasm,  separating 
two  considerable  parts  of  the  earth,  in  or  near  the  district 
inhabited  by  man.     The  possibility  of  some  geological  con- 
vulsion at  or  about  that  time,  and  somewhere  near  where 
mankind  then  were,  can  indeed  be  neither  affirmed  nor  de- 
nied —  no  history  or  geography,  sacred  or  secular,  having  any 
thing  to  say  about  it.     The  first  named  idea  we  are  disposed 
the  rather  to  embrace,  it  appearing  to  us  the  more  plausible, 
as  it  certainly  is  the  more  common.     The  implication  seems 
to  be  that  of  a  division  or  dispersion  of  nations,  like  that  of 
streams  of  water  from  one  source,  and  that  as  this  occurred 
in  the  days  of  Peleg,  he  received  his  name  from  this  event. 
It  is  worthy  of  notice  that  the  original  term,  or  the  root  from 
which  it  comes,  is  elsewhere,  as  e.  g.,  Psalm  55  :  9,  applied 
to  denote  not  a  physical  but  a  moral  division,  and  in  the  place 
just  referred  to,  one  singularly  analogous   to  that  which  we 
take  to  have  given  occasion  to  Phaleg's  name.    Josephus 
says,  "  He  was  called  Phaleg,  because  he  was  born  at  the 
dispersion  of  the  nations   to   their   several  countries ;   for 
Phaleg  among  the  Hebrews  signifies  division" 

Now,  upon  examination,  it  will  be  ascertained  that  this 

man  Phaleg  or  Peleg  was  born  the  one  hundred  and  first 

year  after  the  flood.     If  this  was  the  name  given  him  at  his 

birth  because  that  was  the  exact  era  of  the  Dispersion,  and  if 

14 


302  WHAT    THE    NAME    "PELEG"    INDICATES. 

we  allow  some  ten  or  twenty  years  to  intervene  between  the 
first  arrival  of  the  migrators  in  Shinar  and  this  event  —  an 
interval  apparently  requisite  for  taking  the  inchoative  steps, 
making  the  indispensable  preparatory  arrangements,  and  the 
actual  commencement  and  prosecution  of  the  work  event- 
uating in  a  division  or  dispersion  of  the  people,  —  it  will  then 
have  been  eighty  or  ninety  years  after  the  deluge  that  the 
immigrants  arrived  at  that  spot  on  the  Euphrates  where  they 
concluded  to  establish  themselves.  As,  however,  Peleg  lived, 
in  all,  two  hundred  and  thirty-nine  years,  and  as  in  the  pas- 
sage referred  to  it  is  only  said,  in  general  terms,  that  "  in  his 
days  was  the  earth  divided,"  several  writers  of  note  have 
preferred  a  later  period  in  Peleg's  life  than  that  of  his  birth, 
as  the  exact  epoch  of  the  dispersion,  —  some  his  midlife,  i.  e. 
one  hundred  and  twenty  years  subsequent  to  his  birth  ;  which, 
added  to  the  one  hundred  years  preceding  his  birth,  would 
bring  the  period  of  the  dispersion  to  two  hundred  and  twenty 
years  posterior  to  the  flood,  and  so  the  date  of  the  arrival  of 
the  Shinar  immigrants  at  their  new  home  about  two  hundred 
or  two  hundred  and  ten  years  after  the  egression  of  our  patri- 
arch and  his  family  from  the  ark.  In  such  case  the  name 
Peleg  must  have  been  assigned  to  him  who  bore  it  either 
prophetically,  or  else  was  not  the  appellation  originally  given 
him,  but  was  appropriated  years  afterwards,  and  on  account 
of  the  occurrence  of  the  event  which  it  designated.  The 
Comprehensive  Commentary,  in  notes  on  Gen.  11 :  1,2,  says, 
"Many  learned  men  are  of  opinion  that  the  events  here 
recorded  occurred  about  the  time  of  Peleg's  birth,  or  one 
hundred  and  one  years  after  the  deluge ;  but  their  arguments 
are  by  no  means  conclusive  ;  and  the  idea  impressed  on  the 
mind  in  reading  the  chapter,  of  the  numbers  to  which  the 
family  of  Noah  was  already  increased,  favors  the  opinion 
that  a  longer  number  of  years  had  elapsed.  Probably  the 
division  of  the  earth  before  mentioned  was  a  distinct  trans- 
action from  the  dispersion  which  took  place  on  this  occasion. 


QUERY   AS     TO    THE    IMMIGRANTS.  303 

Some  regular  division  of  the  earth  seems  to  have  taken  place 
at  the  time  Peleg  was  born,  probably  by  divine  appointment, 
under  the  direction  of  Noah  and  his  sons." 

Another  question  concerning  which  you  will  doubtless  wish  to 
hear  something  remarked,  and  which  we  could  not  indeed  justi- 
fiably pass  by  in  silence,  is  this :  Did  all  or  only  a  part  of  man- 
kind, then  existing,  constitute  the  company  who  journeyed  from 
the  east  and  became  settlers  in  Shinar  ?  Let  the  man  step 
forward,  if  such  a  one  there  be,  who  can  decisively  respond 
to  this  interrogation.  In  regard  to  it  there  may  be  considered 
room  for,  as  there  certainly  has  been,  a  discrepance  of 
opinion.  In  the  first  place,  Mr.  Shuckford  is  quite  confident 
in  his  belief  that  only  a  part  of  Noah's  descendants  travelled 
to  Shinar  from  his  far  easterly  mountain-bed  where  he  has 
the  ark  sink  to  rest.  This  author  makes  Noah  and  a  portion 
of  his  progeny,  from  thence  pass  over,  first,  into  the  adjacent 
part  of  Tartary,  and  thence,  soon  after,  into  the  district  lying 
in  the  northwestern  part  of  China.  For  this  his  twofold 
opinion,  his  stronger  or  more  prominent  reasons  are  the  fol- 
lowing :  first,  there  is  no  mention  in  particular  made  of  Noah 
in  all  the  proceedings  connected  with  the  Shinar  settlement 
and  dispersion,  —  a  circumstance  utterly  unaccountable,  in 
his  view,  had  this  patriarch  been  of  the  number.  Second, 
the  character  of  much  of  the  proceedings  of  the  Shinarites 
was  such  as  to  indicate  his  absence,  instead  of  presence. 
Third,  China,  historically  viewed,  must  have  been  at  least  as 
early  settled  as  Chaldea.  Fourth,  a  Chaldean  tradition 
about  the  Deluge,  (formerly  referred  to)  makes  Xisuthrus, 
(so  they  called  Noah),  after  coming  with  his  wife,  daughter, 
and  pilot,  forth  from  the  ark,  and  offering  sacrifice,  to  disap- 
pear and  never  to  be  seen  again ;  whilst  Xisuthrus's  sons, 
according  to  the  same  tradition,  journeyed  towards  Baby- 
lonia, and  built  Babylon  and  several  other  cities.  Fifth,  the 
language  and  learning,  as  well  as  history  of  the  Chinese,  all 
favor  this  opinion.  There  are  reasons  —  which  Mr.  Shuck- 


304  WHETHER   ALL     OR    ONLY   A   PART 

ford  specifies  —  for  believing  that  the  Chinese  Fohi  (Fohee) 
and  Noah  were  one  and  the  same  person.  (See  Shuckford's 
Connexions,  vol.  1,  book  2,  p.  99,  &c.)  That  some  of  these 
reasons,  as  expanded  by  this  writer,  are  very  plausible,  can- 
not with  reason  be  disputed. 

There  are  other  authors  of  prominence  who,  whilst  they 
do  not  accord  in  opinion  with  Shuckford  respecting  the 
extreme  orient  landing  of  the  ark,  and  so  concerning  the 
locality  of  the  prime  settlement  of  the  Noachic  family  after 
leaving  it,  yet  so  far  agree  with  him  as  to  imagine  that  those 
whom  the  sacred  historian  speaks  of  in  chapter  11:  2,  as 
migrating  to  Shinar,  were  only  a  part  of  the  existing 
human  race.  Preferring  the  Septuagint,  or  some  similar,  to 
the  Hebrew  chronology,  or  selecting  a  later  period  than  that 
of  the  birth  of  Peleg  as  indicating  the  epoch,  and  thus  making 
room  for  it,  they  held  forth  that  the  Babelic  dispersion 
occurred  at  a  considerably  later  period  than  the  beginning  of 
the  second  century  after  the  Deluge,  and  that,  under  the 
direction  of  Noah  or  of  Noah's  God,  there  had  occurred  a 
previous  division  or  dispersion  of  our  second  father's  descend- 
ants ;  and  that  those  who  at  length  migrated  to  Shinar  were 
not  under  the  guidance  of  the  best  of  leaders,  or  under  the 
influence  of  the  best  of  impulses,  and  were  mostly  indeed 
Hamites.  A  little  of  Mr.  Bryant's  view,  as  given  in  his 
Ancient  Mythology,  (vol.  6,  p.  260,)  is.  the  following:  — 
"  When  mankind  had  become  very  numerous,  it  pleased  God 
to  allot  to  the  various  families  different  regions  to  which  they 
were  to  retire :  and  they  accordingly,  in  the  days  of  Peleg, 
did  remove  and  betake  themselves  to  their  different  depart- 
ments. But  the  sons  of  Cush  would  not  obey.  They  went 
off  under  the  conduct  of  the  arch-rebel  Nimrod,  and  seem  to 
have  been  for  a  long  time  in  a  roving  state  ;  but  at  last  they 
arrived  at  the  plains  of  Shinar.  These  they  found  occupied 
by  Ashur  (Gen.  10:  11)  and  his  sons;  for  they  had  been 
placed  there  by  divine  appointment.  But  they  ejected  him 


OF  THE  NOACHID.E  ENTERED  SHINAR.       305 

and  seized  upon  his  dominions."  With  this  view  of  Bryant, 
Dr.  J.  P.  Smith  substantially  agrees.  The  view  of  Mr. 
Gleig  may  be  seen  in  detail  in  his  History  of  the  Bible, 
vol.  1,  chap.  5.  It  would  seem  necessarily  to  follow  from  all 
interpretations  of  the  record  of  this  type,  that  what  Moses 
relates  as  occurring  at  Babel,  of  which  we  are  soon  to  speak, 
had  little  to  do  with  the  actual  origination  of  the  various 
languages  and  nations  of  the  earth.  From  the  tenor  of  their 
reasoning  it  is  manifestly  the  impression  of  most  if  not  all  of 
the  authors  to  whom  we  are  now  alluding,  that  such  were  the 
motives  by  which  the  Shinaric  Babel-builders  were  actuated, 
as  to  be  necessarily  preclusive  of  the  idea  that  either  Noah 
or  any  of  that  portion  of  his  progeny  of  similar  moral  or 
spiritual  type  with  him,  could  have  mingled  with  such  a  band, 
or  been,  after  the  most  distant  manner  even,  participants  in 
their  deeds.  And  this  last-named  impression,  perhaps,' may 
have  constituted  the  prime  motive  power  in  the  devising  of 
the  theory  at  which  we  have  been  hinting. 

Now,  as  it  may  be  said  both  of  Mr.  Shuckford's  view  and 
of  the  somewhat  variant  one  of  Mr.  Bryant,  that  they  do  not 
appear  to  harinonize  with  the  most  literal  or  direct  interpreta- 
tion of  the  Mosaic  account,  the  view  naturally  suggested  by 
the  language  of  Moses  to  the  mind  of  the  plain,  unsophisti- 
cated reader  seems  to  us  preferable,  if  the  difficulties  ap- 
parently standing  in  the  way  of  its  adoption  can,  at  the  same 
time,  and  after  a  manner  coincident  with  reason,  be  met  and 
overcome.  We  submit,  then,  whether  such  reader,  upon 
casting  his  eye  over  the  first  and  second  verses  of  the  eleventh 
chapter  of  Genesis,  would  fail  to  receive  the  impression  that 
the  totality  of  then  existent  mankind  are  comprised  in  the 
migrating  company  that,  journeying  from  the  east,  entered  the 
plain  of  Shinar.  May  there  not  be  a  rational  entertainment 
of  the  belief  that  during  the  entire  lapse  of  a  century,  or  of 
two  or  even  three  centuries,  from  the  deluge  —  falling,  as 
either  extreme  of  this  vaguely  indicated  period  would, "  in  the 


306  THE    UNITY    OF    THE    SHINARIC    BAND 

days  of  Peleg," — the  whole  of  postdiluvian  humankind 
would  be  under  the  influence  of  strong  and  controlling  im- 
pulses, to  keep  together  ?  Near  relationship,  warm  mutual 
affection,  regard  to  safety  amidst  threatening  dangers,  on  the 
one  hand,  —  and  on  the  other,  the  previously  ascertained 
peculiar  eligibility  of  the  broad,  beautiful,  fruitful  Shinaric 
plain,  lying  between  and  on  either  side  of  the  rivers  Tigris 
and  Euphrates,  and  extending  some  distance  both  above  and 
below  their  junction — these  all,  together  with  the  mutual 
assistances  which  could  in  various  ways  be  rendered,  and 
which  could  not,  up  to  this  time,  be  well  dispensed  with, 
would,  we  may  believe,  serve  to  bring  them,  in  unbroken 
ranks,  into  this  exceedingly  inviting  territory,  —  a  territory, 
every  thing  considered,  which  would  much  surpass  any  of 
prior  occupancy  or  discovery.  The  Sovereign  Supreme  had 
indeed  a  great  and  wise  purpose  to  accomplish.  He  would 
not  have  the  different  and  distant  portions  of  the  globe 
remain  unpeopled  or  unimproved.  He  knew  that  it  would 
tend  to  the  more  rapid  increase  of  the  posterity  of  our 
patriarch,  after  a  certain  season,  to  have  the  bands  loosed 
which  kept  them  together.  Population  is  known  to  increase 
far  more  rapidly  in  new  countries,  where  the  resources  of  the 
land  are  without  limit,  than  in  old  ones,  where  men  keep 
together  in  masses,  whose  numbers  press  closely  on  the  means 
of  subsistence.  Intellectually,  morally,  religiously,  important 
benefits  would,  when  the  proper  season  should  come,  accrue 
to  men  by  being  thrown  into  distinct  bands,  into  separate  and 
more  or  less  isolated  communities.  The  population  of  the 
Old  World  had  suffered  immense  detriment  by  living  as  com- 
pactly, as  much  huddled  together,  as  they  did.  Were  man- 
kind not  depraved  —  were  their  moral  state  altogether  what 
it  ought  to  be  —  then,  to  the  extent  that  the  means  of  subsist- 
ence, convenience,  and  general  comfort  would  allow,  they 
might  cluster  together.  Heaven  is  not  and  never  will  be 
rendered  uncomfortable,  how  densely  populated  soever  any 


NOT  LONG  TO  REMAIN  UNBROKEN.        307 

• 

portions  of  its  dominions  are,  or  all  of  them  may  at  length 
become.  The  greater  and  more  dense  such  a  population  as 
the  heavenly,  the  better.  But  Adam's  posterity,  Noah's 
posterity— both  the  first  and  second  father's  children,  here, 
are  a  good  deal  different  from  our  Divine  Father's  children, 
human  and  angelic,  on  the  celestial  plains.  The  inhabitants 
of  this  planet  are  "  very  far  gone  from  original  righteous- 
ness "  —  so  far  gone,  that  the  mutual  influence  of  example, 
and  of  unobstructed  and  intimate  general  intercourse,  would 
on  the  whole  be  far  from  salutary  —  far  from  promotive  of 
individual  and  social  welfare  and  happiness.  Better,  consid- 
ering what  they  are,  vastly  better,  to  have  many  and  great 
obstructions  thrown  in  the  way  of  intimate  and  general  asso- 
ciation and  intercourse ;  better  to  have  them  divided  off  into 
a  multiplicity  of  tribes,  and  peoples,  and  nations,  by  such 
varieties  of  language  as  to  prevent  different  portions  from 
transmitting  their  thoughts  to  all  other  minds,  or  their  feel- 
ings to  all  other  hearts ;  and  by  such  impediments  to  inter- 
course as  are  interposed  by  what  are  termed  natural  barriers* 
—  by  rivers,  hills,  seas,  mountains. 

The  humankind,  at  the  time  they  entered  the  plains  of 
Shinar,  were  on  the  eve  of  the  period  that  divine  wisdom 
and  benevolence  had  fixed  on  for  throwing  them  apart  into 
different  bands ;  for  commencing  a  process  which  would 
eventuate  in  locating  them  in  numerous,  diversified,  and 
wide  spread  portions  of  earth's  broad  surface  —  north,  south, 
east,  west ;  in  this  continent  and  in  that ;  until  all  habitable 
parts  of  the  globe  should  be  marked  by  human  footprints. 


EVENING   TWENTY-FOURTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 


How  interesting  a  fact  is  that  which  is  made  known  to  us 
in  the  initial  verse  of  the  eleventh  chapter  of  Genesis  —  a 
fact  of  which  we  should  have  remained  in  profound  ignorance 
but  for  divine  communication.  At  the  time  of  the  immigra- 
tion to  the  plains  of  Shinar,  and  ever,  antecedently,  —  from 
the  hour  that  human  lips  first  uttered  a  syllable,  downward, 
—  only  one  language  prevailed  among  mankind.  "  The 
whole  earth  was  of  one  language  (lip)  and  of  one  speech," 
one  kind  of  words.  By  "the  whole  earth,"  is  obviously 
meant,  in  this  verse,  the  inhabitants  of  the  whole  earth  —  a 
Hebraic  idiom  of  very  frequent  occurrence.  If  you  inquire, 
What  was  this  language  ?  you  must  allow  us  to  inquire  in 
return,  What  answer  shall  we  give  ?  As  the  question,  how- 
ever, is  one  which  cannot  with  reason  be  entirely  waived, 
we  will,  in  the  first  place,  venture  the  remark,  that  it  was 
doubtless,  in  our  view,  the  language  which  Noah  and  his 
sons  spake  when  they  came  from,  whilst  in,  and  before  they 
entered,  the  ark ;  the  language  which  Noah's  father,  Lamech, 
and  grandfather,  Methuselah,  spake.  And  as  these  lived, 
the  former  fifty-six,  and  the  latter  two  hundred  and  forty- 
three  years  on  the  earth  anterior  to  the  death  of  Adam,  it 
was  the  language  which  our  first  father  spake.  Such  were 


INQUIRY   AS    TO    THE    PRIMITIVE    LANGUAGE.         309 

the  circumstances  that,  though  the  interval  was  a  protracted 
one,  no  direct  divine  interference  was  requisite  to  preserve 
the  unity.  There  was  little  room  for  any  great  change  of 
language,  when  mankind  lived  so  long  as  they  are  reported 
to  have  done  before  the  flood,  —  when  two  links  (Adam, 
Methuselah)  constituted,  so  to  speak,  the  whole  chain  from 
the  Creation  to  the  Deluge.  This  longevity  was  a  potent 
and  effectual  conservative  of  the  great  vehiele  of  thought  in 
its  primal  form,  as  you  must  all  perceive.  If  some  new 
terms  were,  from  time  to  time,  introduced ;  if  the  vehicle, 
after  a  while,  became  even  considerably  more  capacious  than 
it  primarily  was,  the  great  comparative  compactness  of  the 
population,  (at  which  we,  on  a  former  occasion,  hinted,)  pre- 
vailing during  a  part  of  that  morning  of  the  world,  would 
afford  the  means  of  easy  and  rapid  transmission  to  all  the 
portions  of  the  body.  There  were  no  great  inducements 
tending  to  the  origination  of  considerable  alterations  in  lan- 
guage ;  but  strong  motives  operating  to  the  contrary. 

But,  toward  the  affording  of  an  answer  to  the  question, 
What  was  the  primitive,  and,  up  to  the  period  which  Genesis 
11:  1  contemplates,  the  universal  language  of  mankind? 
you  may  think  we  have  still  not  approached  very  near.  It 
would,  young  gentlemen,  require  a  considerable  measure  of 
courage,  or  of  confidence,  to  essay  an  approach  much  nearer. 
No  question  in  philology  has,  perhaps,  been  more  largely  or 
warmly  discussed  than  has  this.  "The  Hebrew,  Syriac, 
Arabic,  Chaldee,  Phoenician,  Egyptian,  Ethiopic,  Sanscrit, 
and  Chinese,"  remarks  Dr.  Hales,  "  have  each  had  their  re- 
spective advocates  for  the  palm  of  priority  and  precedence." 
He  might  have  added  to  the  list  several  others.  "  Of  these 
various  claimants,"  continues  Dr.  Hales, "  the  language  spoken 
by  the  inhabitants  of  the  first  districts  occupied  by  Noah's 
family,  after  the  flood,  seems  to  have  the  fairest  pretensions  to 

originality,  or  rather  of  affinity  to  the  primitive  language, 
14* 


310         INQUIRY   AS    TO    THE    PRIMITIVE   LANGUAGE. 

supposing  all  to  be  altered,  more  or  less,  by  lapse  of  time 
and  change  of  place ;  — 


Mortalia  facta  peribunt, 


Nedum  sermonum  stet  honos  et  gratia  yivax.  —  HOR. 

And  accordingly  '  the  tongues  of  the  Japhethites '  are  men- 
tioned, Gen.  10 :  5  ;  'the  tongues  of  the  Hamites/  verse  20 ; 
and  '  the  tongues  of  the  Shemites,'  verse  31 ;  which,  perhaps, 
are  placed  last,  as  varying  least  from  the  primitive  language, 
because  they  lay  nearest  to  the  original  settlement  after  the 
deluge."  —  Of  all  the  families  of  languages,  the  Shemitic 
used  to  be  the  more  favored  claimant ;  and  though  there  was 
rivalry  among  the  members  of  this  latter  family,  the  Hebrew 
collected  by  far  the  more  numerous  suffrages  in  its  favor. 
"From  the  antiquities  of  Josephus  and  the  Targums,  or 
Chaldee  paraphrases  of  Onkelos  and  of  Jerusalem,"  says  Dr. 
Wiseman,  "down  to  Anton,  in  1800,  Christians  and  Jews 
considered  its  pretensions  as  almost  definitively  decided ;  and 
names  of  the  highest  rank  in  literature,  —  Lipsius,  Scaliger, 
Bochart,  and  Vossius,  —  have  trusted  the  truth  of  many  of 
their  theories  to  the  certainty  of  this  opinion." 

In  favor  of  the  position,  that  the  Hebrew  was  the  primitive 
and  only  prevalent  language  from  the  Creation  till  the  time 
of  the  Confusion  of  Tongues,  we  will  hint  at  two  of  the  more 
prominent  and  plausible  arguments  which  have  fallen  under 
our  notice.  The  first  of  them  is  in  substance  this :  —  The 
names  of  persons  and  of  places  mentioned  in  the  early  history 
of  the  world  are  pure  Hebrew.  Thus  Adam,  Eve,  Cain, 
Abel,  Seth,  Mehujael,  Methusael,  Methuselah,  Noah,  Shem, 
&c. ;  and  of  Eden,  Nod,  Enoch,  (the  city,)  &c.,  are  all  words 
of  purely  Hebraic  form,  structure,  and  signification.  These 
are  found  in  the  earliest  history  —  that  from  the  pen  of 
Moses ;  —  nor  is  there  the  least  evidence  or  appearance  of 
their  being  interpretations  or  translations,  by  the  historian, 
of  primitive  or  earlier  terms,  as  has  by  some  been  suggested. 


INQUIRY    AS    TO    THE     PRIMITIVE    LANGUAGE.          oil 

Had  they  been  translations,  the  fact,  it  is  thought,  would 
have  somehow  been  indicated.  The  sacred  penman  gives 
not  the  faintest  or  most  distant  hint  of  giving  a  translation  of 
preexistent  terms ;  nor  does  he,  in  the  whole  course  of  his 
history,  when  speaking  of  the  names  of  persons,  utter  a  single 
word  from  which  we  can  infer  the  existence  of  an  earlier 
language.  Nay,  more:  all  the  proper  names  in  the  ante- 
diluvian history  are  personally  and  historically  descriptive, 
and  the  verb  or  appellative  which  forms  the  name  really  and 
always  gives  the  sound  and  meaning  wanted ;  which  could 
not  be,  if  the  compositions  which  we  have  were  a  translation 
from  a  prior  document  in  a  different  language.  Thus : 
"Ishah,  because  she  was  taken  from  Ish"  (Gen.  2 :  23)  ; 
"Adam  called  the  name  of  his  Ishah,  Havah,  because  she 
was  the  mother  of  all  Hai"  (3 :  20)  ;  "  Cain,  because  Canithi, 
a  man  from  Jehovah,"  (4:1).  "  She  called  his  name  Shetk, 
for  God  shath  for  me  another  seed,"  (verse  20.)  Think  of 
each  name,  too,  as  having  in  it  prophetic  or  historic  signifi- 
cancy  —  as  embracing  in  itself  the  reason  why  that  person  or 
place  was  given  that  name  and  not  another.  —  The  other 
argument  urged  in  support  of  the  before-mentioned  position 
is,  in  a  word,  this :  —  If  any  of  the  three  branches  of  Noah's 
offspring  were  not  involved  in  the  crime  of  the  Babel-builders, 
they  would  not  be  directly  involved  in  the  judgment  which 
fell  upon  those  builders,  —  in  other  words,  they  would  almost 
certainly  retain  the  language  previously  spoken  by  them,  that 
is,  the  primeval  language.  But  we  shall  hereafter  see  a  good 
reason  for  inferring  that  the  Shemites  were  not  involved  in 
the  crime;  consequently,  that  they  continued  afterward  to 
speak  the  same  tongue  as  before;  but  it  is  known  that  a 
peculiarly  prominent  branch  of  them  did  afterward  speak 
the  Hebrew  —  that  this  was  eminently,  exclusively,  their 
language. 

Many  distinguished  philologists  however  there  are,  and  the 
number  appears  to  have  been  of  late  considerably  on  the 


312          INQUIRY   AS    TO    THE    PRIMITIVE    LANGUAGE. 

increase,  who  think  they  find  such  formidable  objections 
against  this  position,  as  to  render  it  inadmissible  ;  who  feel 
disposed  without  hesitancy  to  declare  that,  whether  con- 
sidered historically,  or  with  reference  to  its  internal  structure, 
the  Hebrew  cannot  lay  just  claim  to  be  the  primitive  tongue. 
We  will  merely  remark,  as  to  some  of  the  objections  which 
we  have  seen  specifically  urged  against  this  position,  that 
they  do  not  appear  to  us  of  any  allowable  weight,  being 
based  upon  the  assumption  that  the  prime  language  of  man- 
kind was  of  human  invention  —  an  assumption  the  validity 
of  which  we  can  by  no  means  admit. 

The  claims  of  the  Chinese  to  be  the  primitive  tongue  have 
been  warmly  advocated  by  Webb,  and  several  other  writers. 
The  leading  considerations  that  are  urged  appear  to  be,  its 
confessedly  great  antiquity,  and  its  simple  monosyllabic 
character.  Of  it,  (in  his  Connexions,  vol.  1,  p.  122)  Mr. 
Shuckford  says,  that  "it  seems  to  have  some  marks  of  being 
the  first  original  language  of  mankind.  Its  words  are  few, 
—  and  all  its  words  are  confessedly  monosyllables.  If  Noah, 
the  great  father  and  restorer  of  mankind,  upon  coming  out  of 
the  ark,  settled  here,  it  is  very  probable  that  he  left  here  the 
universal  language  of  the  world.  One  thing,  at  least,"  he 
continues,  "appears  pretty  clear,  that  whatever  was  the 
original  of  the  Chinese  tongue,  it  seems  to  be  the  first  that 
ever  was  in  those  parts.  All  changes  and  alterations  of 
language  are  commonly  for  the  better,  but  the  Chinese 
language  is  so  like  a  first  and  uncultivated  essay,  that  it  is 
hard  to  conceive  any  other  tongue  to  have  been  prior  to  it ; 
and  whether  this  be  the  first  language  or  not,  the  circum- 
stances of  this  language  consisting  of  monosyllables,  is  a  very 
considerable  argument  that  the  first  language  was  in  this 
respect  like  it ;  for  though  it  is  natural  to  think  that  man- 
kind might  begin  to  form  single  sounds  first,  and  afterwards 
come  to  enlarge  their  speech  by  doubling  and  redoubling 
them ;  yet  it  can  in  no  wise  be  conceived  that  if  men  had  at 


CONCERNING   THE     ORIGIN    OF   LANGUAGE.  313 

first  known  the  plenty  of  expression  arising  from  words  of 
more  syllables  than  one,  any  person  or  people  would  have 
been  so  stupid  as  to  have  reduced  their  languages  to  words 
of  but  one." 

In  support  of  the  Sanskrit  as  the  primeval  tongue,  some  of 
the  chief  arguments  set  forth  by  its  advocates  are,  its  great 
though  unknown  antiqueness;  its  radical  materials  being 
monosyllabic ;  and  its  regularity,  richness  and  finish.  Be- 
sides the  several  other  tongues  named  as  claimants  in  the 
quotation  made  from  Dr.  Hales,  who  would  have  dreamed 
that  the  world  could  have  ever  seen  such  visionaries,  yet 
such  there  have  been,  as  have  zealously  advocated  the  Cel- 
tic, the  Biscayan,  and  even  the  Low  Dutch,  as  the  language 
of  our  first  and  second  father  ! 

Whilst,  however,  there  have  been  warm  and  elaborate 
endeavors  made,  and  by  large  numbers,  to  maintain  some 
particular  known  language  to  have  been  the  primeval,  there 
have  been,  on  the  other  hand,  some  of  the  greatest  names  in 
in  the  study  and  comparison  of  languages,  who  believe  and 
argue  that  "  the  primeval  language  has  not  been  anywhere 
preserved,  but  that  fragments  of  it  must,  from  the  common 
origin  of  all,  everywhere  exist ;  that  these  fragments  will 
indicate  the  original  derivation  and  kindredship  of  all ;  and 
that  some  direct  causation  of  no  common  agency  has  op- 
erated to  begin,  and  has  so  permanently  affected  mankind  as 
to  establish,  a  striking  and  universally  experienced  diversity." 
These  last  are  the  words  of  a  later  writer  than  Grotius,  who 
himself  said,  "  Nullibi  puram  exstare,  sed  reliquias  ejus  esse 
in  linguis  omnibus." 

Whatever  the  prime  language  of  the  human  kind  was,  one 
thing  we  think  may  with  positiveness  be  declared  concerning 
it :  that  it  originated  not  on  earth,  but  in  heaven ;  was  the 
invention  of  God,  not  of  man.  It  was  a  gift  communicated 
to  our  species  by  the  Supreme  Donor,  and  early  —  so  early 
as  the  day  on  which  creatures  of  this  order  began  to  be.  So 


314  CONCERNING   THE    ORIGIN    OF    LANGUAGE. 

the  Bible  teaches  ;  so  human  reason,  unperverted,  teaches. 
As  man  was  not  a  monad,  nor  barely  so  much  higher  a 
creature  as  a  monkey,  primarily ;  as  his  distinguishing  traits 
as  an  intellectual  and  moral  being  are  not  the  exclusive  re- 
sult of  spontaneous  and  prolonged  development ;  as  he  came 
from  the  hands  of  a  Wise  and  Omnific  Creator,  and  in  the 
form  and  with  the  powers  of  a  man  —  not  of  an  inferior 
animal  —  of  man,  too,  physically  and  mentally  mature,  not 
with  the  mind  and  body  of  an  infant ;  as  he  was  designed  to 
occupy  a  peculiarly  important  position,  and  act  an  important 
part,  as  an  intellectual,  social,  and  moral  being,  on  this 
planet,  his  Creator  would  afford  him  the  indispensable  means 
and  facilities,  at  the  outset,  for  answering  the  great,  mo- 
mentous purposes  of  his  existence ;  —  and  one  of  the  promi- 
nent among  these  would  be  Language,  —  the  main,  almost 
exclusive  vehicle  for  conveying  the  products  of  one  mind  and 
heart  to  the  mind  and  heart  of  another ;  for  prosecuting  an 
interchange  of  those  higher  and  more  valuable  commodities 
especially  —  the  mental  and  the  moral.  All  theories  whose 
object  or  burden  is,  to  find  the  origin  of  language  anywhere 
short  of  the  Divine  Munificence,  involve  impracticabilities 
most  gigantic,  and  absurdities  most  gross.  If  any  linguistic 
vehicle,  copious  enough  to  be  wrorthy  of  the  name  of  language, 
were  not  necessarily,  for  the  most  part,  arbitrary,  having  in 
it  little  of  what  grammarians  term  onomatopoeia,  the  ab- 
surdity would  not  appear  so  great  or  monstrous  of  assigning 
it  a  human  paternity.  A  language,  made  up  mostly  of  sounds 
between  which  and  the  meaning  there  is  no  natural  connec- 
tion, if  it  were  from  man,  would  be,  we  may  suppose,  from 
him  in  an  associated  capacity ;  would  be  the  result  of  consul- 
tation and  mutually  expressed  consent  and  arrangement. 
Then,  what  mind  of  the  least  remove  from  perfect  stolidity 
or  obtuseness  can  fail  to  perceive  the  absurdity  involved :  a 
conversational  convention  or  conventions  held  —  a  lingual 
consultation  had  to  invent  or  settle  upon  a  vehicle  of  conver- 


ABUSE    OF   LINGUISTIC    UNITY.  315 

sation  or  medium  of  intercourse!  Verily  the  projectors  of 
such  a  theory  can  hardly  fail  of  securing  notoriety  —  of  im- 
mortalizing themselves ;  —  but  we  are  not  so  enormously  en- 
vious as  to  grudge  them  the  kind  of  notoriety  which  they 
have  been  or  shall  be  so  successful  as  to  secure.  Greatly 
prefer  remaining  would  we  in  our  sombrous  obscurity.  This 
is  not  indeed  a  solitary  instance  —  it  is  one  of  the  multitudi- 
nous instances  —  in  which  the  human  heart's  reluctance 
manifests  itself  to  give  unto  the  Lord  the  tribute  of  honor 
and  of  gratitude  which  is  his  due. 

This  one  language,  whatever  one  it  was,  flowing,  as  we 
have  thus  briefly  argued,  directly  from  the  choice  and  full 
fountain  of  Heavenly  Munificence,  had,  along  with  other 
divine  gifts,  been  greatly  misused  or  perverted  by  the  ante- 
diluvians ;  and  the  time  was  now  hurrying  on  apace,  when 
there  would  be  afforded  by  postdiluvians,  too,  a  specimen  of 
abuse.  Among  the  Noachidae,  thus  far,  the  linguistic  unity 
had  served  a  good  purpose ;  and  had  it  thereafter  been  made 
to  serve  no  other,  the  linguistic  diversities  which  have  since, 
and  to  an  extent  great  and  in  some  respects  very  incommo- 
dious, prevailed,  would  probably,  for  the  most  part,  have 
remained  unknown.  From  some  of  the  divine  regulations, 
restraints,  and  provisions,  already  hinted  at,  you  cannot  but 
have  caught  a  glimpse  of  God's  anxious  desire  that  the  post- 
diluvian race  should  not  run  into  the  impious  and  horrid 
excesses  of  antediluvian  times.  He  did  not  wish  to  bring 
another  sweeping  and  universally  devastating  deluge  of  waters 
over  the  earth  ;  he  had  determined  he  would  not  —  had  even 
declared  he  would  not  —  on  this  point  the  Deity  had  com- 
mitted himself.  But  whilst  God  had  determined  and  declared 
this,  he  had  not  done  it  unwittingly  or  incautiously.  Pie  had 
coetaneously  determined,  as  occasions  or  urgent  necessities 
should  present  themselves,  to  erect  the  barriers,  or  give  rise 
to  the  obstacles,  one  after  another,  which  should  prevent  such 
superfluities  of  naughtiness,  such  awful  excesses  of  wicked- 


316     DIVINE   DETERMINATION   AGAINST   THE   RETURN 

ness,  from  again  having  an  existence  among  human  kind. 
The  social  principle  in  man  is  of  God's  implanting ;  and 
whilst  its  exercises  are  kept  within  legitimate  bounds,  such 
bounds  as  not  to  contravene  God's  purposes,  or  thwart  his 
kind  designs  toward  the  race,  it  may  have  its  free  indulgence 
and  its  thrilling  play ;  —  but  when  it  is  suffered  greatly  to 
transcend  those  bounds,  the  consequence  will  be  not  only 
offence  to  God,  but  injury  to  man ;  which  latter  indeed  is 
a  thing  not  well  pleasing  to  Infinite  Benevolence.  If  the 
Ruler  Supreme,  then,  throw  obstacles  in  the  way  of  such 
excessive  and  criminal  exercise,  in  the  case  of  those  who 
are  guilty  in  the  matter;  if  he  throw  inconveniences  and 
discomforts  into  their  lot ;  if  he  resort  to  efficient  means  for 
putting  them  apart ;  drive  them,  not  as  individuals  indeed, 
but  in  families,  tribes,  bands,  into  different  and  distant  local- 
ities, they  will  have  no  good  reason  for  surprise  or  complaint. 
Restraints  to  sin,  obstructions  to  its  increasing  and  awfully 
abounding  prevalence,  how  rough  soever  the  garb  which  they 
may  wear,  are  less  judgments  than  mercies  ;  have  an  angel's 
heart,  though  they  appear  to  show  the  lion's  paw  or  the  croc- 
odile's covering. 

Such  mischiefs  as  rose  out  of  the  prevalence  of  one  lan- 
guage in  the  Old  World,  the  Most  High  was  resolutely  deter- 
mined should  not  prevail  in  the  New.  When  He  therefore 
should  witness  the  inceptions  of  mischiefs  among  the  postcli- 
luvians  from  this  source,  and,  with  such  a  mind  as  He  had, 
knew  to  what,  if  unchecked,  they  would  grow ;  when,  in  the 
world  this  side  the  flood,  he  should  observe  the  social  prin- 
ciple inchoately  abused,  and  foresee  the  danger  of  its  run- 
ning into  abuses  far  greater  —  abuses  too  that  would  be  likely 
to  become  widespread  and  permanent,  unless  some  counter- 
acting force  or  preventive  influence  should  be  thrown  in  —  he 
might  be  looked  for  to  interpose  ;  after  some  manner  to  stay 
the  commencing  or  stop  the  threatening  tide.  An  occasion, 
as  we  believe  has  been  already  hinted,  is  now  about  to  arise, 


OF   ANTEDILUVIAN    WICKEDNESS.  317 

demanding  God's  interposition  to  prevent  a  great  and  alarm- 
ing increase  of  wickedness ;  to  break  into  fragments  a  social 
body  that  threatened  to  assimilate  itself,  in  moral  character- 
istics, to  that  awfully  corrupt  body  of  the  Old  World  whom 
the  Almighty,  in  just  judgment  toward  them,  but  in  mercy 
toward  the  then  future  generations,  destroyed. 

For  a  brief  season  after  their  arrival  on  the  plains  of 
Shinar  the  immigrants  would  reside  in  tents ;  but  being  well 
pleased  with  what  they  saw  of  the  country  in  general,  and 
induced  particularly  by  the  measure  of  fertility  which  their 
inceptive  agricultural  operations  showed  it  to  possess,  they 
soon  commenced  the  erection  of  more  permanent  as  well  as 
more  commodious  and  costly  habitations  ;  and  as  a  large 
proportion  of  these,  we  may  suppose,  were,  for  safety  as  well 
as  sociality,  located  contiguous  to  each  other,  there  would, 
in  the  course  of  a  very  few  years,  appear  a  cluster  amount- 
ing to  a  scattered  village  of  not  inconsiderable  dimensions 
—  which  seems  to  have  at  length  excited  the  ambition  of 
more  or  less  to  see  the  settlement  so  enlarged,  and  structures 
erected  of  such  size  as  well  as  numbers,  as  to  constitute  a 
respectable  city.  There  being  no  stone  quarries  to  be  found 
in  all  that  region,  and  the  settlers  wishing  the  edifices  which 
they  reared  to  be  of  substantial  materials,  and  discovering 
the  means  in  abundance  for  it  they  made  bricks,  and,  with 
bitumen  for  cement,  they  progressed,  not  indeed  with  re- 
markable rapidity,  but  as  fast  as  their  other  necessary  avoca- 
tions, as  well  as  their  gradually  increasing  numbers,  would 
allow,  in  this  work.  Thus  far  there  may  have  been  no 
marked  criminality  in  the  motives  of  the  greater  portion  at 
least,  probably  of  nearly  the  whole  company,  of  the  Shi- 
narites.  There  were  a  few  enterprising  and  ambitious  spirits, 
doubtless,  who  from  near  the  commencement  of  the  time  in 
which  they  entered  upon  the  erection  of  permanent  habita- 
tions, began  to  indulge  more  of  an  aspiring  disposition  than 
they  had  ever  before  felt ;  and  every  thing  about  them  seemed 


318  AMBITIOUS    ASPIRATIONS    AT    SIIINAE. 

adapted  to  foster  such  a  spirit.  One  active,  bold,  energetic, 
and  comparatively  young  man  in  particular,  who  had  already 
signalized  himself  somewhat,  in  such  ways  as  were  practica- 
ble —  more  especially  in  hunting  —  and  had  been  for  a  while 
the  leader  of  a  band  in  this  —  had  begun  to  meditate  greater 
things,  and  put  himself  forward  as  leader ;  in  which  thing 
the  majority  probably  at  first  rather  unwittingly  or  silently 
acquiesced  ;  and  afterwards,  as  his  claims  became  more  and 
more  prominent  and  plausible,  the  major  portion,  setting  aside 
or  too  much  overlooking  patriarchal  authority,  might  be  in- 
duced to  lift  their  voice  for  him.  Noah  and  his  three  sons 
had  hitherto  been  the  counsellors  and  principal  leaders 
of  the  junior  band ;  and,  on  account  of  their  seniority  and 
greater  wisdom  and  experience,  should  have  been  still,  and 
ever,  until  they  should  be  actually  disabled  by  age  and  con- 
sequent mental  or  bodily  infirmity.  Noah,  in  particular, 
should  have  continued  not  only  their  magnate,  but  their  fa- 
vorite ruler,  we  would  think,  while  life  should  last,  or  until 
dotage  should  absolutely  compel  his  retirement  from  the  ac- 
tivities of  busy,  or  his  abandonment  of  the  cares  and  per- 
plexities of  regal  life.  He  was  indeed  now  an  old  man, 
beginning  to  bend  under  the  weight  of  years,  and  perhaps 
little  able  to  bear,  longer,  aught  of  what  was  intrinsically 
onerous.  That  this  patriarch  was  not  among  the  Shinar 
immigrants  we  are  unable  to  discover  any  such  reasons 
as  to  constrain  us  to  believe.  It  has  been  conjectured 
by  some,  and  with  much  strenuousness  maintained,  that 
he  could  not  have  been  of  the  company  who  came  hither, 
because  no  particular  mention  is  made  of  him  at  any  time 
after  the  plains  of  Shinar  are  entered.  But,  his  name  had 
not  been  mentioned  by  the  historian  during  the  period  of  at 
least  sixty  or  seventy  years  before  —  never  subsequent  to 
the  time  in  which  he  uttered  the  prophecies  on  which  we 
briefly  commented  —  if  we  except  the  brief  record  which 
chronologically  belongs  to  a  period  considerably  posterior  to 


THE    TOWER     OF    BABEL WHY    ERECTED.  319 

that  which  we  have  yet  reached.  If  there  is  no  mention 
directly  made  of  him  for  some  three  hundred  years  anterior 
to  his  death,  then  the  silence  of  the  historian  cannot  reason- 
ably be  produced  as  evidence  that  he  was  not  one  of  the 
company  who  came  to  Shinar.  If  there  is  no  mention  of 
him  for  so  long  a  period,  there  is  then,  of  course,  no  record 
of  his  being,  during  that  period,  elsewhere.  As  to  the  silence 
of  the  historian  about  our  patriarch  for  so  long  a  season,  we 
hardly  need  be  surprised  at  it,  if  we  will  but  consider  two 
things :  First,  That  Noah  had  already  been  far  more  the 
subject  of  notice,  on  the  part  of  the  sacred  writer,  than  any 
man  who  had  preceded  him,  as  great  and  noted  as  some  of 
them  must  in  their  day  have  been.  Secondly,  The  archaic 
annalist  is  studying  brevity,  that  he  may  the  sooner  arrive  at 
that  portion  of  our  postdiluvian  father's  descendants,  of  which 
"  the  father  of  the  faithful,"  that  is,  Abraham,  stands  at  the 
head. 

Next  came  the  proposition  to  erect  a  tower  —  perhaps  not 
a  loudly  or  openly  proclaimed  proposition  at  the  first,  particu- 
larly as  to  the  chief  object  the  projector  had  in  view  in  its 
erection  —  but  a  whispered  suggestion,  coming  primarily  from 
some  rather  young  but  ambitious  spirit,  and  thrown  cautiously 
into  the  ear  of  first  a  few,  "  to  feel  of  them,"  as  the  phrase  is ; 
and  receiving  encouragement,  it  is  spread  more  widely,  and 
by  degrees  more  openly,  until  the  prospect  appears  fair  for 
its  being  entertained  favorably  by  the  majority,  who  had 
more  of  youth  on  their  side  than  wisdom,  more  energy  than 
caution,  more  ambition  or  pride  than  piety. 

There  have  been  various  conjectures  concerning  the  object 
or  objects  had  in  view  by  the  projectors  in  the  erection  of  this 
tower.  Josephus  and  some  others  have  supposed  that  it  was 
a  measure  of  safety  against  some  future  devastating  flood. 
There  is,  in  this,  no  great  compliment  paid  to  the  faith  of  the 
Babel-builders,  or  else  not  to  their  faculty  of  memory.  They 
had  surely  been  taught  by  their  pious  ancestor  what  God  had 


320  THE    TOWER     OF   BABEL  WHY   ERECTED. 

promised  and  covenanted  in  relation  to  this  matter.  If  they 
did  not  believe,  they  have  indeed  had  a  multiplicity  of  imita- 
tors since  their  day.  Never,  from  their  time  downward,  has 
it  been  fashionable  with  the  far  major  portion  of  mankind  to 
believe  God,  or  to  live  and  act  by  faith  in  the  declarations  of 
Infinite  Truth.  But  if  these  Babel-builders  were  without 
faith,  must  we  believe  them  to  have  been  also  without  sense 
or  reason  ?  so  utterly  bereft  or  destitute  of  it  as  to  flatter 
themselves  with  the  fond  conceit  that  any  considerable  num- 
ber of  future  generations  could  find  a  means  of  safety  in  any 
such  tower  as  to  magnitude  which  they  could  build  ?  or  to 
select  such  a  locality  as  a  valley  or  plain,  instead  of  a  lofty 
mountain,  to  serve  for  protection  against  the  towering  waves 
of  another  Noachian  Flood  ? 


EVENING   TWENTY-FIFTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

It  has  by  some  been  conjectured  that  the  Babelic  Tower 
was  designed  as  a  temple  of  idolatry ;  but  of  this  there  can  be 
produced  no  sufficient  evidence ;  nor  does  it  seem  to  us  prob- 
able that  the  sin  of  idolatry  began  to  prevail  at  so  early  a 
season  after  the  deluge.  Nor  can  we  entertain  the  notion 
that  it  was  intended  as  a  mere '  monument  of  architectural 
effort  and  skill,  like  the  pyramids  of  Egypt ;  though  it  is  not 
impossible  but  that  in  prosecuting  the  enterprise  there  was 
felt  some  ambitious  desire  to  transmit  to  succeeding  genera- 
tions, a  name  illustrious  for  grand  design  and  bold  undertak- 
ing. Of  the  paramount  objects  of  the  projector  or  projectors, 
one,  and  that  which  for  a  while  at  first  might  have  been 
almost  exclusively  promulgated,  not  improbably  was,  to  serve 
as  a  landmark  in  that  sea  of  land,  the  vast  and  unbroken 
plains  of  Babylonia  and  the  territory  adjacent.  They  who, 
from  time  to  time,  and  for  one  and  another  purpose,  should 
traverse  those  plains,  the  compass  of  which  was  then  unknown, 
would  really  feel  to  be  essential  something  of  this  kind  to 
serve  as  a  landmark ;  without  which  they  might  frequently 
be  unable  to  find  their  way  back  to  the  seat  of  population ; 
and  thus,  involuntarily,  considerable  numbers  might  be  scat- 
tered abroad,  and  lost  as  to  the  main  settlement.  There  was 
no  doubt  a  higher  object,  however,  in  the  mind  of  at  least  the 


322  THE   BABELIC  ^TOWER,   ITS    DESIGN. 

master  spirit ;  which  was,  to  build  up  a  vast  central  metropo- 
lis of  a  gradually  extending  and  prospectively  mighty  empire 
—  a  sort  of  universal  monarchy.  By  the  arrogant  and  aspir- 
ing leader  in  the  notable  emprise  there  was  manifestly 
cherished  a  controlling  desire  that  there  should  be  no  scatter- 
ing of  the  people  into  isolated  and  independent  communities ; 
no  dispersions  of  different  portions  of  the  Shinaric  inhabitants 
into  many,  and  far  distant,  and  widely  separated  localities, 
which  should  lead  to  the  establishment  of  a  multiplicity  of 
governments,  with  as  many  rulers  at  their  heads  respectively. 
Whilst  it  was,  as  a  matter  of  course,  expected  that  the  popu- 
lation would,  even  rapidly,  increase,  —  such  was  the  number 
already  as  to  impel  to  this  expectation  —  it  was  the  ambitious 
wish  of  the  leader,  and  soon,  probably,  far  beyond  the  wish  of 
him  alone,  that  that  increase,  calling  for  as  rapidly  increasing 
extent  of  territory  to  be  occupied,  should  extend  continuously 
in  a  widening  circle,  having  for  a  common  centre  the  city 
whose  foundations  were  already  laid,  with  its  projected  lofty 
tower  now  to  be  built,  to  serve  to  add  ornament  and  magnifi- 
cence to  the  metropolis ;  and,  in  anticipation  of  a  rising 
necessity,  now  and  then,  for  the  employment  of  martial  force 
to  quell  the  insurrection,  or  by  compulsion  bring  back  stray- 
ing bands  or  migrating  hordes,  to  answer,  on  the  one  hand,  if 
need  be,  as  a  place  of  resort  for  defence  or  security,  and,  on 
the  other,  as  a  place  of  deposit  and  custody  for  arms. 

The  site  of  the  city  and  tower  which  at  a  subsequent 
period  received  the  name  of  Babel,  was  on  the  west  bank  of 
the  Euphrates,  some  three  hundred  miles  above  its  mouth, 
and  about  twice  that  distance  east  of  Jerusalem,  —  the  same 
site  in  part,  we  may  believe,  which  was  occupied  afterwards 
by  the  great  and  renowned  city  of  Babylon.  The  city  of  the 
Babel-builders,  indeed,  was  probably  the  nucleus  of  the  last 
named ;  not  having  been  destroyed,  nor  even  the  begun  tower 
itself  annihilated,  as  some  have  erroneously  imagined,  at  the 
time  of  the  Confusion. 


SIZE    AND  FORM    OF    THE    TOWER.  323 

Different  suppositions  have  been  made  respecting  the  size  and 
form  of  the  projected  and  begun  tower  of  the  aspirant  Shinaric 
builders.  That  it  was  intended  to  be  a  lofty  structure,  for  one 
of  that  age,  and  for  the  number  of  hands  that  could  or  would 
be  employed  upon  it,  appears  from  chapter  11:4.  It  is 
spoken  of  by  Josephus  as  also  of  "  great  thickness."  Whether 
its  shaft  was  round,  square,  hexagonal,  or  octagonal,  we  can- 
not speak  determinately.  You  have  probably  seen  it  deline- 
ated as  being  in  shape  round,  with  a  spiral  pathway  leading 
to  the  top  (Stackhouse,  vol.  1,  p.  172)  ;  but  it  appears  more 
credible  that  it  was  square  or  quadrangular ;  and  that  struc- 
tures remaining  in  various  parts  of  the  world  are  transcripts 
or  imitations  of  it.  Strabo  calls  it  "  a  square  pyramid ; "  and 
"  a  quadrangular  pyramid  "  it  is  affirmed  to  have  been  by 
Coleman. 

In  regard  to  the  precise  character  of  the  proceeding  —  the 
kind  and  measure  of  the  impiety  or  culpability  involved  in  the 
tower's  erection  —  what  shall  be  said  ?  That  the  instigator 
and  leader  in  the  affair,  and  those  under  his  direction  or  in- 
fluence, contravened  any  direct  and  known  command  of 
Heaven,  there  are  writers  who  say  that  there  is  no  scriptural 
authority  for  believing.  As  much  as  you  have  examined  the 
writings  of  Moses,  have  you  ever  discovered  any  promulgated 
precept,  relative  to  the  matter,  that  was  violated  by  them, 
unless  it  be  that  general  injunction  given  to  the  Noachic 
family  just  after  their  leaving  of  the  ark,  to  "  multiply  and 
replenish  the  earth  ?  "  But  had  they  known  or  remembered 
this  general  direction,  must  it  necessarily  have  been  apparent 
to  them  that  in  the  act  of  rearing  the  tower  there  would  be 
any  contravention  of  it  ?  It  is  asserted  by  Josephus,  —  but  on 
what  authority  may  not  be  to  you  very  discernible,  unless  it 
be  the  precept  just  adverted  to,  —  that  "  God  also  commanded 
them  to  send  colonies  abroad  for  the  thqrough  peopling  of  the 
earth,  and  that  they  might  not  raise  seditions  among  them- 
selves, but  might  cultivate  a  great  part  of  the  earth,  and 


324   CHARACTER  OF  THE  ACT  OF  THE  BABEL  BUILDERS. 

enjoy  its  fruits  after  a  plentiful  manner.  But  they  were  so 
ill-instructed  that  they  did  not  obey  God ;  for  which  reason 
they  fell  into  calamities,  and  were  made  sensible  by  experi- 
ence of  what  sin  they  had  been  guilty.  For  when  they 
flourished  with  a  numerous  youth,  God  admonished  them 
again  to  send  out  colonies ;  but  they,  imagining  that  the  pros- 
perity they  enjoyed  was  not  derived  from  the  favor  of  God, 
but  supposing  that  their  own  power  was  the  proper  cause  of 
the  plentiful  condition  they  were  in,  did  not  obey  him.  Nay, 
they  added  to  this  their  disobedience  to  the  divine  will,  the  sus- 
picion that  they  were  therefore  ordered  to  send  out  separate 
colonies,  that  being  divided  asunder  they  might  the  more 
easily  be  oppressed."  (Ant.  p.  29.) 

Now  whether  this  be  an  exactly  veritable  statement  of  the 
case,  or  not,  we  have  seen  it  in  substance  reaffirmed  by 
several  writers ;  and  both  Josephus  and  they  ought  to  know 
what  they  have  so  positively  averred  to  be  so.  We  suspect 
predications  of  this  nature  to  have  been  made  by  these 
authors  rather  on  the  ground  of  inference,  than  of  any  direct 
divine  precept  that  they  could  find.  In  this  latter  respect 
they  were  probably  no  more  successful  than  you  have  been 
—  unless  they  resorted  to  tradition  rather  than  the  historic 
averments  of  Moses.  Yet  —  suppose  the  Babel-builders,  with 
their  chieftain,  were  not  aware  of  transgressing  any  direct 
divine  injunction ;  nay,  more :  suppose  there  never  had  been 
issued  by  the  Lord  any  command  from  which  they  could  infer 
that  the  creation  of  such  a  structure,  and  for  such  a  purpose, 
would  contravene  the  will  of  Heaven,  —  it  still  remains  a  fact, 
that  they  were  running  counter,  in  their  schemes  and  wishes, 
to  God's  intentions.  The  Ruler  Supreme  had  in  his  mind 
quite  a  different  purpose  or  plan  from  theirs.  He  saw  what 
their  motives  and  designs  were.  He  wanted  no  universal 
monarchy  to  be  founded  on  this  his  footstool  —  no  metropolis 
of  the  whole  earth,  either  on  the  banks  of  the  Euphrates  or 
elsewhere.  He  desired  that  when  the  time  should  come  — 


INFERENCE   RELATIVE   TO    THE   PATRIARCH.          325 

and  it  was  now  just  at  hand  —  the  different  quarters  of  the 
earth  should  be  colonized ;  the  human  kind  should  be  sprin- 
kled, so  to  speak,  over  different  parts  —  north,  south,  east, 
west, — of  J;he  globe's  surface ;  thrown,  as  we  intimated  a  while 
ago,  into  many  peoples,  and  tribes,  and  nations.  And  his 
purpose  must  stand  —  his  plans  be  carried  out  —  his,  not 
theirs.  Their  ambition  and  policy  on  the  one  hand,  and  His 
wisdom  and  benevolence  on  the  other,  in  regard  to  the  sta- 
tioning of  Noah's  fast-increasing  descendants,  and  to  what 
pertained  otherwise  to  their  lot,  were  so  far  from  coalescing, 
that  both  could  not  be  met  and  satisfied.  The  former, 
therefore,  must  be  foiled.  And  God  adopts  his  own  wise 
and  mild  mode  of  doing  it.  He  does  not  hurl  down  his 
thunderbolts  and  destroy  them ;  he  does  not  cause  the  tower 
they  were  rearing,  to  totter  and  fall  and  bury  them  in  its 
ruins.  He  inflicts  upon  them  no  physical  suffering.  He 
only  throws  in  a  bar  to  concerted  action ;  their  main  medium 
of  intimacy  —  this  is  interfered  with ;  their  channel  of  inter- 
course was  blocked  up ;  the  bands  which  had  united  them, 
bound  them  closely  together,  were  broken ;  they  are  obliged 
to  stop  in  their  work  —  cannot  proceed.  Oh,  how  are  the 
wise  taken  in  their  own  craftiness ;  and  the  counsel  of  the 
froward,  how  is  it  carried  headlong.  The  Lord  disappointeth 
the  devices  of  the  crafty,  so  that  their  hands  cannot  perform 
their  enterprise.  (Job  5 :  12,  13.)  That  the  projectors  and 
builders  of  the  tower  were  not  under  the  controi  of  commend- 
able or  justifiable  impulses,  is  very  evident,  since  they  had 
not  regard  to  the  divine  glory  or  will  in  the  matter.  Pride, 
a  towering  ambition,  a  spirit  of  self-aggrandizement,  actuated 
them  in  what  they  did. 

But  where  is  our  patriarchal  sage  whilst  the  plot  is  matur- 
ing, and,  afterward,  whilst  the  tower  is  rising  toward  the 
sky  ?  Where  is  that  aged  man  of  God,  who,  in  years  gone 
by,  when  the  whole  world  had  contemned  and  forsaken  the 
Lord,  and  run  into  flagitious  excesses,  into  the  extremes  of 
15 


326  INFERENCE   RELATIVE   TO    THE   PATRIARCH. 

wickedness,  still  unflinchingly  clung  to  the  Almighty,  and  was 
so  unswervingly  regardful  of  his  Heavenly  Sovereign's  will 
and  pleasure  ?  Has  he  been  privy  to  the  scheme  of  the  Ba- 
bel-builders, and,  though  too  aged  and  infirm  to  bring  physi- 
cal aid  to  the  enterprise,  has  he  lent  it  his  countenance,  and 
encouraged  and  urged  others  to  summon  their  physical  ener- 
gies to  the  work  of  pushing  the  offensive  structure  toward  the 
heavens  ?  Not  so.  Aware  what  manner  of  spirit  this  old 
saint  was  of — what  a  tender  and  superlative  concern  had 
been  for  centuries  cherished  by  him  for  the  divine  glory,  and 
how  opposed  to  human  when  set  in  antagonism  with  and  pro- 
cured at  the  expense  of  the  divine,  —  those  occupying  the  van 
in  the  Babelic  translation  would  be  so  far  from  expecting  to 
obtain  his  sanction  to  a  project  like  theirs,  if  its  features  in 
frank  and  undisguised  fairness  were  all  laid  before  him,  took 
great  pains,  no  doubt,  to  shroud  in  impenetrable  concealment 
their  main  designs;  endeavored,  by  subterfuges,  misrepre- 
sentations, ingenious  devices,  dishonest  artifices,  to  keep  him 
as  ignorant  as  possible  of  the  leading  motives  impelling  them 
to  the  enterprise.  This  they  would  be  strongly  induced  to 
do  from  fear  of  antagonistic  influence  from  one  so  venerable, 
and  whose  will  had  formerly,  for  so  long  a  season,  been  law 
to  his  offspring.  If,  after  any  manner,  from  any  source,  this 
patriarchal  chief  did  receive  hints  or  gather  suspicions  rela- 
tive to  their  principal  object  in  this  undertaking,  and  if  he  had 
received  at  any  time  such  intimations  from  on  high  as  to 
bring  him  to  some  understanding  of  God's  designs  or  inten- 
tions in  regard  to  the  settlement  of  his  descendants,  and  the 
formation  of  a  large  number  of  tribes  and  nations  in  different 
parts  of  the  wide  world — a  thing  which  we  think  there  is 
pretty  good  reason  for  believing  did  occur  at  the  period  and 
in  connection  with  the  prophecies  which  he,  at  a  prior  season, 
had  uttered  respecting  the  prospective  situation  or  destiny  of 
his  three  sons  and  their  progeny  respectively  —  he  then  did 
not  fail  to  discountenance  the  ambitious  and  reprehensible 


WHO    WERE    THE    BUILDERS.  327 

proceeding,  and,  to  the  extent  of  his  then  existing  ability, 
labor  to  dissuade  all  over  whom  he  could  hope  to  have  influ- 
ence, from  lending  aid,  in  any  measure  or  manner,  to  the 
work.  If  such  intimations  as  we  have  just  hinted  at  had  been 
received  by  Noah,  he  had  probably  promulgated  the  fact, 
either  years  previously,  or,  it  may  be,  just  before  the  forma- 
tion of  the  project  relating  to  the  city  and  tower.  He  might, 
just  antecedently  to  this  latter,  have  said  to  his  posterity,  now 
on  the  plains  of  Shinar :  "  It  is  not  in  accordance  with  the  will 
of  Heaven,  and  so  will  not  be  expedient  or  proper  for  you  all 
to  entertain  the  idea  of  settling  here  permanently,  and  so,  of 
making  arrangements  accordingly.  Not  only  will  your  num- 
bers soon  become  too  great  for  you  to  be  able  comfortably  to 
reside  or  even  obtain  the  means  essential  to  subsistence  in 
even  so  broad  a  territory  as  this  appears  to  be ;  but  I  have 
received  intimations  from  that  Father  who  originated  our 
being,  and  who  from  his  celestial  pavilion  is  now  looking 
down  upon  us,  that  his  desires  and  designs  are  that  by  you 
and  your  descendants  the  different  portions  of  the  wide  world 
shall  be  colonized."  And  we  may  suppose  our  patriarch  to 
follow  this  general  announcement  with  considerable  par- 
ticularity and  fulness  of  detail.  And  it  may  have  been  this 
announcement  that  gave  rise  indeed  to  the  first  thought,  and 
then  to  the  ripening,  of  the  scheme  we  are  considering.  The 
master  spirit  revolves  the  matter  in  his  mind,  and  says  to 
himself,  "  This  is  not  agreeable  to  me.  Let  me  summon  a 
council,  consisting  of  a  few,  in  whom  I  can  confide,  and  who 
are  accustomed  to  listen  to  me."  The  issue  is,  a  resolution 
that  no  such  occurrence  as  a  sundering  of  the  bands  and  a 
separation  of  the  Shinaric  residents  must  take  place ;  and  then 
the  means  of  prevention  are  considered  and  determined  on :  — 
"  Go  to,"  say  they ;  "  let  us  build  us  a  city  and  a  tower, 
whose  top  may  reach  unto  heaven,  and  let  us  make  us  a 
name,  lest  we  be  scattered  abroad  upon  the  face  of  the  whole 
earth."  Here  then  is  rebellion,  direct  and  stout  rebellion,  and 


328  WHO    DISSENTED    FROM   THE    ENTERPRISE. 

not  merely  against  Noah,  but  God.  And  what  gives  particu- 
lar plausibility  to  this  view  of  the  affair  is,  that  the  leader  in 
the  undertaking  was  called  by  a  name  which  signifies  "  son 
of  rebellion,"  and  which  is  thought  to  have  been  assigned 
him  either  prophetically,  or,  more  probably,  after  and  on  ac- 
count of  his  prominent  agency  in  this  transaction.  This  man, 
with  several  coadjutors  much  resembling  himself  and  under 
his  influence,  appears  to  have  been  successful  in  inducing  a 
large  proportion  of  the  people  —  all  the  Karaites,  nearly  or 
quite  the  whole  number  of  the  Japhethites,  and  of  the  Shem- 
ites  some,  we  cannot  say  just  how  many, — to  unite  with  them 
in  rearing  the  projected  structure.  Among  the  means  used  to 
weaken  and  destroy  the  influence  of  the  patriarch's  counsels, 
remonstrances,  and  entreaties,  with  those  of  them  who  were 
at  first  somewhat  reluctant  about  enlisting  in  the  project,  one 
probably  was,  to  represent  the  old  man  as  in  his  dotage  and 
behind  the  times.  There  were  those,  however,  who,  having 
listened  to  and  profited  eminently  by  this  aged  saint's  instruc- 
tions and  counsels  before,  would  not  turn  a  deaf  ear  to  him 
now.  These  were  the  pious  among  the  Shemites. 

We  some  time  since  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  contrast  in 
character  between  Shem  and  Ham.  These  contrasts  reap- 
pear—  are  distinguishably  stamped  on  their  offspring.  If  the 
Shemites,  for  want  of  numerical  strength,  cannot  control  or 
stay  the  proceedings  in  reference  to  the  tower,  they  can  at 
least  refrain  from  taking  any  part  in  its  erection.  They  can 
continue  at  their  lawful  and  useful  avocations ;  and,  if  not 
all,  a  considerable  proportion  of  them  —  all  the  pious,  and 
probably  some  others  —  did  so.  As  to  the  progeny  of 
Japheth —  they,  like  their  paternal  ancestor  of  that  name, 
were  full  of  energy ;  had  a  soul  fired  with  ambition  and  love 
of  enterprise ;  the  elements  of  greatness  pervading  their 
whole  being ;  panting  to  give  birth  and  enlargement  both  to 
the  useful  and  ornamental  of  life ;  ready  not  only  to  think, 
but  to  act  —  having  not  alone  heads  to  plan,  but  hands  to 


THE   DIVINE    INTERFERENCE.  329 

execute;  inclined  in  a  measure,  but  not  equally  with  the 
Shemites,  to  inquire  about  the  moralities  of  projects  and  pro- 
ceedings ;  somewhat,  but  not  excessively,  scrupulous  —  less 
inquisitive,  as  to  the  right  and  the  wrong,  than  the  expedient 
and  inexpedient ;  differing  both  from  the  Shemite  and  Hamite 
lines  in  several  important  particulars  besides — what  course 
do  these  Japhethites  take  in  relation  to  the  tower?  We  have 
already,  in  a  general  way,  answered  that  question.  That 
they  would  in  a  body  go  with  the  Shemites,  could,  with  such 
traits  as  we  have  specified,  be  hardly  expected ;  nor,  with 
the  measure  of  scrupulosity  which  they  had,  that  they  would, 
unanimously  and  with  full  consent,  unite  with  the  prime 
projectors  and  their  kin,  the  Hamites.  The  far  major  num- 
ber, however,  nearly  the  whole,  say,  Let  the  tower  go  up ; 
and  they  prove  not  inefficient  auxiliaries.  Indeed  the  tower 
would  have  never  reached  a  moiety  of  the  size  and  height  it 
did,  but  for  them. 

"  The  Lord  "  —  the  same  yesterday,  to-day,  and  forever  — 
not  indifferent  to  earthly  transactions  then,  any  more  than 
now  —  "  came  down  to  see  the  city  and  the  tower  which  the 
children  of  men  were  building,"  (fifth  verse).  Mark  the 
phrase,  "the  children  of  men"  It  may  be  used  here,  as 
some  have  thought,  in  contradistinction  from  "  the  children 
of  God"  indicating  that  none  of  the  pious  embarked  in  the 
transaction — a  thing,  it  is  to  be  believed,  strictly  true;  or  it 
may  have  been  intended  to  express,  in  a  general  way,  the 
fact  that  the  people,  i.  e.,  the  major  portion,  were  more  or 
less  concerned  in  the  enterprise.  Unquestionably  was  this 
so,  for  the  project  would  never  have  gone  forward  as  it  did, 
had  not  the  majority  of  the  Shinarites  been  in  its  favor. 

The  Omniscient  inspected  the  whole  character  of  the  pro- 
ceeding; traced  out  all  the  vast  results  which  would,  both 
sooner  and  later,  here  and  there,  flow  out  of  it,  should  the 
scheme  be  consummated.  "  Go  to  "  —  He  is  resolved  what 
to  do.  The  narration,  as  Dr.  Smith  remarks, "  is  given -in  the 


330  THE    CONFUSION   OP   TONGUES  : 

extreme  style  of  anthropopathic  and  anthropomorphic  de- 
scription." "  Go  to,  let  us  go  down  and  there  confound  their 
language,  that  they  may  not  understand  one  another's  speech. 
And,"  it  is  added,  "they  left  off  to  build  the  city,"  including, 
doubtless,  the  tower.  And,  in  the  way  of  explanation,  is  this 
remark  subjoined  by  the  narrator,  "Therefore  is  the  name  of 
it  called  Babel,  (Confusion,)  because  the  Lord  did  there  con- 
found the  language  of  all  the  earth."  Note,  en  passant,  the 
concluding  clause  of  that  verse,  (ninth.)  which  some  seem 
anxious  to  limit  in  import  to  "all  the  land"  as  meaning 
merely  Shinar  —  because  they  do  not  wish  to  be  precluded 
the  entertainment  of  a  favorite  idea,  namely,  that  there  were 
other  descendants  of  Noah  existing  at  the  time  elsewhere, 
and  in  a  variety  of  localities ;  and,  moreover,  speaking, 
probably,  ere  then,  several,  they  do  not  tell  us  how  many, 
languages  or  dialects. 

The  confusion  of  tongues  which  took  place  at  Balel — what 
shall  we,  young  gentlemen,  say  upon  this  topic  ?  If  there  be 
a  man  possessing  the  exact  diagnosis  of  the  case,  we  wish  he 
might  occupy  our  chair  while  this  point  is  under  consideration. 
It  was  rather  a  waggish  remark  of  a  piquant  writer,  that  man 
being  an  instrument  of  a  thousand  strings,  there  might  be 
expected  all  sorts  of  tunes  from  him.  Certain  it  is,  that  on 
this,  as  on  innumerable  other  subjects,  there  is  considerable 
diversity  of  sentiment  or  conjecture.  As  to  some  of  its 
features,  we  are  indeed  prepared  to  speak  positively ;  as  to 
others,  we  can  only  speak  conjecturally,  or  lay  before  you  the 
conjectures  of  others.  In  the  first  place,  we  may  say,  what 
is  in  antagonism  to  the  speculations  of  some,  that  there  was 
miraculous  intervention.  God  interposed,  and  directly,  in 
the  case.  An  effect  or  effects  were  produced  traceable  im- 
mediately to  Him.  And  so  the  historian  palpably  represents 
it.  In  the  next  place,  the  principal  effect  pertained  to  lan- 
guage. This  we  say,  in  opposition  to  the  opinion  of  some, 
the  learned  Vitringa  for  one,  that  the  operation  was  not  upon 


INQUIRY   AS    TO    ITS    CHARACTER.  331 

the  words  or  modes  of  speech  at  all,  but  upon  the  tempers, 
views,  and  counsels,  of  those  engaged  in  the  Babel-building 
enterprise.  The  author  just  named,  thinks  that  the  language 
of  the  record  may  be  understood  as  importing  such  a  discord- 
ance of  opinion,  such  a  dissimilarity  or  want  of  unity  in 
counsel  and  purpose  produced,  as  effectually  to  prevent  a 
further  prosecution  of  the  work,  and  such  a  sundering  of  the 
bonds  of  amity  as  to  lead  to  a  separation  socially;  —  that 
there  was  a  bar  interposed  to  further  concord  —  a  splitting 
of  the  multitude  into  various  antagonistic  or  contending  fac- 
tions, which  could  no  longer  cooperate,  but  were  necessitated 
to  separate  and  disperse  in  different  directions  —  leading  to 
the  fulfilment  of  the  divine  purpose,  and  the  frustration  of 
theirs.  In  support  of  this  interpretation,  Vitringa  appeals  to 
the  usage  of  the  sacred  writers  in  several  passages,  where 
this  sense  of  the  terms  appears  to  be  involved. 

If  there  were  no  other  objection  to  be  urged  against  the 
interpretation  just  stated,  this,  we  think,  may  be :  that  it  fails 
tcr  meet  the  reason  assigned  in  the  seventh  verse  for  con- 
founding the  language  of  the  builders,  to  wit,  "  that  they  may 
not  understand  one  another's  speech."  That  interpretation 
likewise  appears  objectionable  on  the  ground  of  its  leaving 
out  of  view  the  great  ulterior  end  of  the  divine  interposition, 
viz.,  the  creating  of  a  bar  to  intercourse  which  would  not 
simply  cause  a  cessation  of  the  work  —  a  matter  in  itself  of 
comparatively  small,  perhaps  I  may  say,  of  no  moment ;  nor 
of  one  leading  to  a  separation  or  dispersion,  for  the  time 
being,  or  temporarily,  alone  —  but  a  bar  effective  of  per- 
manent results,  of  the  kind  just  intimated;  not  barely  a 
putting,  but  a  keeping,  of  the  different  portions  of  them 
permanently  apart ;  a  settling  of  them,  in  an  organized  ca- 
pacity, in,  different  localities  on  the  earth's  surface;  the 
bringing  into  existence  of  obstacles  to  their  future  coalition 
or  universal  union  under  one  government.  This  would  be 


332  THE   CONFUSION   OF  TONGUES. 

effectually  done,  and,  as  we  understand  the  record,  was 
accomplished,  by  a  touching  of  the  medium  of  intercourse  — 
by  bringing  about  a  change,  adequate  to  the  producing  of  the 
desired  result,  in  language. 


EVENING   TWENTY-SIXTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

Mr.  Bryant  attempts  to  adduce  reasons  for  believing  that 
the  confusion  of  speech  was  a  failure  of  the  physical  organs, 
(miraculously  inflicted  indeed,)  producing  unintelligible  pro- 
nunciation of  one  and  the  same  language;  that  this  effect 
was  temporary,  ceasing  upon  a  disruption  of  the  confederacy ; 
and  that  it  extended  no  farther  than  to  the  house  of  Gush  and 
his  adherents.  From  what  has  been  already  hinted  by  us 
you  may  infer  that  we  do  not  accord  with  him  in  belief  as  to 
two  of  the  points,  at  least,  here  presented.  This  author's 
opinion  of  the  very  limited  extent  of  the  effect  which  he  holds 
to  have  been  produced,  has  its  foundation  in  the  notion  that 
only  the  Cushites,  and  a  comparatively  small  number  besides, 
were,  either  actively,  or  after  any  manner,  engaged  in  the 
Babelic  project.  This  last  he  has  not  proved ;  nor  does  it 
appear  to  us  to  accord  with  the  tenor  of  the  Mosaic  history 
on  the  subject.  Not  a  particle  more  satisfactory  to  us  is  the 
idea  that  the  lingual  effect  of  which  he  speaks  was  only  tem- 
porary, inasmuch  as  there  is  in  it  an  ignoring  or  losing  sight 
of  the  ulterior  and  paramount  end  of  divine  interference  in 
the  matter  —  which  end  was  indicated  by  us  in  the  closing 
part  of  the  preceding  Exercise.  '* ,  •-! 

As  to  opinions  entertained  respecting  the  particular  lin- 
guistic effect  or  effects  produced  at  Babel,  they  may  be 
15* 


331  THE    CONFUSION     OF    TONGUES. 

reduced  to  three.  The  first  that  we  will  name  is,  That  there 
was  preternatural  origin  then  and  there  given  to  a  consider- 
able number  of  new  languages  having  little  or  no  affinity  to 
each  other;  and  that  these  languages  may  reasonably  be 
conceived  as  numerous  as  the  families  or  tribes  who  separated 
from  each  other.  The  second  is,  That,  exclusive  of  the  prime 
language  still  probably  retained  among  those  who  took  no 
part  in,  but,  on  the  contrary,  were  hostile  to,  the  Babelic 
transaction,  there  were  two  or  more  new  languages  miracu- 
lously originated — diverging  into  varieties  of  dialect  so 
variant  as  to  be,  for  the  most  part,  mutually  unintelligible ; 
and  that  these  corresponded  numerically  with  the  affiliated 
companies  between  whom  there  was  a  severance,  and  differ- 
ence of  local  or  territorial  allotment.  The  third  opinion  is, 
That  it  consisted  of  alterations  in  the  pronunciation,  by 
permutation  of  the  labial  letters,  for  instance,  with  the 
palatal.  This  last  hypothesis,  that  is,  of  a  diversified  change 
in  the  pronunciation,  leading  to  variety  and  persistency  of 
result,  has  been  thought  to  derive  support  in  part  from  the 
word  J15E3  saphah,  which,  though  in  the  first,  sixth,  and 
seventh  verses,  translated  language,  literally  means  lip;  in 
the  utterance  of  words  in  any  language,  the  lip  being  one  of 
the  principal  organs.  And  the  Jewish  writer  Philo,  in 
speaking  of  the  event  at  Babel,  says,  "  He  (Moses)  calls  it 
'  confusion,''  whereas  if  he  had  designed  to  indicate  the  rise 
of  different  languages,  he  would  have  more  aptly  called  it 
'  division  ; '  for  those  things  which  are  divided  into  parts,  are 
not  so  much  confounded  as  distinguished."  The  meaning  of 
the  verb  to  oalal,  occurring  in  the  Mosaic  account  twice, 
is  imagined  to  lend  support  to  this  opinion.  Its  signification 
is  to  mingle  things  together,  it  is  said,  so  as  to  produce  com- 
pounds or  heterogeneous  masses.  A  lip  may  be  said  to  be 
confounded,  when  a  mode  of  utterance,  previously  distinct^ 
clear,  and  intelligible,  becomes  by  any  means  impeded,  thick, 
stammering,  or,  in  a  word,  confused.  A  confusion  rising  out 


HISTORIC   NOTICES    AND    TRADITIONS.  335 

of  a  novel  and  great  variety  of  pronunciation,  it  has  been 
suggested,  would  in  its  consequences  be,  for  the  time  being, 
much  the  same  as  if  it  were  a  multiplication  of  new  languages ; 
and  the  dialectic  discrepancies,  thus  originating,  would  become 
gradually  more  and  more  marked,  as  men  became  more  widely 
separated,  in  families  and  tribes,  from  each  other ;  and  by  the 
influence  of  climate,  laws,  customs,  religion,  and  various 
other  causes,  till  they  finally  issued  in  substantially  different 
languages. 

An  ethnological  inquiry,  young  gentlemen,  will  after  a 
while  claim  from  us  some  notice,  and  we  may  then  probably 
ascertain  whether  the  study  of  Comparative  Philology,  so 
diligently  prosecuted  in  certain  quarters  of  late  years,  has  not 
led  to  some  results  tending  toward  a  decision  of  this  interest- 
ing but  difficult  question.  It  will  not  disappoint  or  surprise 
us  if  from  that  source  gleams  of  light  shall  be  gathered  afford- 
ing some  aid,  if  not  in  arriving  at  a  determinate  conclusion, 
at  least  at  some  plausible  conjectures  as  to  which  of  the  three 
opinions  that  have  been  specified  has  in  it  most  of  the 
semblance  of  truth. 

As  to  the  alleged  events  in  general  at  Babel,  although, 
when  we  have  the  testimony  of  an  inspired  historian  respect- 
ing them,  our  minds  should  require  naught  corroborative  from 
any  other  source  in  order  to  produce  full  belief,  yet  when  his- 
toric notices  or  traditions  are  elsewhere  to  be  found  bearing 
on  the  same  points,  it  may  not  be  amiss  to  allude  to  at  least 
some  of  them.  Josephus  says,  "  The  Sybil "  —  a  fictitious 
appellation  of  some  unknown  author,  probably  about  the 
second  century  before  Christ  —  "  The  Sybil  also  makes  men- 
tion of  this  Tower  and  of  the  Confusion  of  the  Language, 
when  she  says  thus :  When  all  men  were  of  one  language, 
some  of  them  built  a  high  tower,  as  if  they  would  thereby 
ascend  up  to  heaven,  but  the  gods  sent  storms  of  wind  and 
overthrew  the  tower,  and  gave  every  one  his  peculiar 
language ;  and  for  this  reason  it  was  that  the  city  was  called 


336        NOTICES  OF  THE  EVENTS  AT  BABEL. 

Babylon."  (Ant.,  b.  1,  chap.  4,  sec.  3.)     Alexander  Polyhis- 
tor,  who  flourished  about  one  hundred  years  before  Christ, 
has  the  following  passage  :  "  Eupolemus,  in  his  book  concern- 
ing the  Jews  of  Assyria,  says  that  the  city  of  Babylon  was 
first  built  by  those  who  had  been  preserved  from  the  deluge ; 
that  they  were  giants,"  —  i.  e.,  in  the  Greek  sense,  not  so 
much  men  of  enormous  stature,  as  their  mythological  heroes, 
of  great  prowess  —  "that  they  also  erected  the  tower  of 
which  history  gives  account ;  but  that  it  was  overthrown  by 
the  mighty  power  from  God,  and  consequently  the  giants 
were  scattered  abroad  over  the  whole  earth."    Abydenus, 
who  is  said  to  have  flourished  in  the  fourth  century  B.  C., 
makes  the  following  statement,  as  quoted  by  Eusebius,  from 
whom  the  preceding  likewise  is  derived :    "  There  are  some 
who  say  that  the  first  men  sprung  out  of  the  earth ;  that  they 
boasted  of  their  strength  and  size ;  that  they  contemptuously 
maintained  themselves  to  be  superior  to  the  gods ;  that  they 
erected  a  lofty  tower  where  now  is  Babylon  ;  then,  when  it 
had  been  carried  on  almost  up  to  heaven,  the  very  winds 
came  to  assist  the  gods,  and  overthrew  the  vast  structure 
upon  its  builders.     Its  ruins  were  called  Babylon.     The  men, 
who  before  had  possessed  one  tongue,  were  brought  by  the 
gods  to  a  many-sounding  voice ;  and  afterwards  war  arose 
between  Cronus  (Saturn)  and  Titan.     Moreover,  the  place 
in  which  they  built  the  tower  is  now  called  Babylon,  on  ac- 
count of  the  confusing  of  the  prior  clearness  with  respect  to 
speech ;  for  the  Hebrews  call  confusion  Babel."     Plato  also 
reports  a  tradition  that,  in  the  golden  age,  men  and  animals 
made  use  of  one  common  language,  but  too  ambitiously 
aspiring  to  immortality,  were,  as  a  punishment,  confounded 
in  their  speech  by  Jupiter. 

You  have  marked  the  fact  that  these  Gentile  notices  repre- 
sent the  work  of  the  Babel-builders  to  have  been  interrupted 
after  a  manner  of  which  the  sacred  historian  makes  no  men- 
tion, viz.:  by  a  tremendous  tempest.  This  super-addition 


THE    CHIEFTAIN   NIMROD.  337 

gives  so  different  a  phase  to  the  divine  conduct  in  the  case, 
that  it  ought  not  to  obtain  credence.  It  is  evident  from  the 
record  of  the  inspired  Moses,  that  the  Almighty  chose  a 
more  mild  and  permanently  effective  method  for  accomplishing 
his  main  design,  namely,  the  dispersion  into  different  parts 
of  the  earth  of  the  inhabitants  of  Shinar.  The  sacred  writer 
merely  tells  us  that  "  they  left  off  to  build  the  city,"  as  a 
consequence  of  confusion  in  their  language  —  being  unable 
longer  to  understand  one  another  or  act  in  concert. 

It  is  the  opinion  of  some  writers  that  this  tower  of  the 
Babel-builders  was  so  massive  a  structure  as  either  to  consti- 
tute the  nucleus  of  the  vast  pile  which  Herodotus  so  particu- 
larly describes  as  reared  by  the  second  founder  of  Babylon, 
i.  e.  Nebuchadnezzar,  or  else  as  affording  a  portion  of  the 
materials  of  which  that  vast  and  wonderful  structure  was 
composed.  As  to  the  identification  of  either  the  first  or 
second  tower  with  any  now  existing  ruin,  it  is  perhaps  im- 
practicable. As  entitled  to  this  distinction,  no  less  than  three 
masses  of  ruin  in  the  region  of  Babylon  have  indeed  been  by 
different  writers  claimed,  to  wit,  Nimrod's  tower  at  Akkerk- 
hoof ;  the  Mujahlibah,  about  950  yards  east  from  the  bank  of 
the  Euphrates,  and  five  miles  above  the  modern  town  of 
Hillah  ;  and  the  Birs  Nimroud,  to  the  west  of  that  river  and 
about  six  mites  to  the  south-east  of  Hillah. 

We  have  spoken  of  a  chieftain  who  instigated  and  led  on 
the  enterprise  of  building  the  city  and  tower  which  have  been  • 
claiming  our  notice.  This  was  Nimrod,  a  son  of  Gush,  and 
grandson  of  Ham  —  a  man  of  great  energy  and  prowess,  who 
had  distinguished  himself  beforehand  as  a  hunter  of  wild 
beasts  —  a  business  not  simply  recreative  but  useful,  situated 
as  were  the  nascent  population  of  those  early  times.  Suc- 
cessful as  an  individual  at  first,  he  soon  gathered  around  him 
a  body  of  athletic  young  men  whom  he  led  and  directed  in 
his  hunting  exercises  and  excursions ;  over  whom  he  obtained 
such  an  ascendency  and  influence  that  they  became  prepared 


338  THE    CHIEFTAIN    NIMROD. 

to  second  him  in  any  project  he  might  undertake,  or  favor 
any  suggestion  which  might  proceed  from  him.  Patriarchal 
authority  and  influence,  before  dominant,  was  thus  gradually 
undermined  or  interfered  with,  until  at  length,  as  to  the 
majority,  the  sinews  of  that  antecedently  venerated  and 
ascendant  power  so  lost  their  tension  and  vigor  that  the 
government  of  this  order  could  no  longer  maintain  its  ground 
—  was,  in  regard  to  that  Babelic  confederacy  or  community, 
subverted  —  not  a  vestige  remaining.  Though,  as  we  have 
seen,  Noah  retained  an  influence  over  the  better,  and,  we 
presume,  larger  portion  of  the  Shemites,  and  some,  not  im- 
probably of  the  Japhethites,  yet  he  was,  after  this  manner  and 
by  this  means,  shorn  of  his  main  strength ;  and  being  ad- 
vanced in  years,  he  was  unfitted  to  make  any  strenuous  efforts 
to  regain  his  former  ascendant  and  authoritative  position  over 
those  who,  so  rebelliously  and  nefariously  as  respected  him, 
had  put  themselves  under  the  chieftaincy  of  a  bold  and 
energetic  junior,  whose  measures  and  movements  were  more 
of  the  type  suited  to  their  tastes  and  preferences.  In  setting 
forth  Nimrod  as  the  prime  subverter  of  the  patriarchal  gov- 
ernment, after  the  deluge,  and  as  the  leader  of  the  enterprise 
pertaining  to  Babel,  we  proceed  upon  the  authority  not  of 
Josephus  alone,  but  of  the  far  larger  number  of  authors  of 
distinction  —  nearly  all  of  this  kind  who  have  specially  in- 
vestigated and  expressed  their  views  on  the  subject.  He  is 
indeed  the  first  individual  who  is  recorded  to  have  aspired  to 
dominion  over  his  fellow-men ;  and  it  being  expressly  said  of 
him  that  "the  beginning  of  his  kingdom  was  Babel,"  (Gene- 
sis 10 :  10,)  what  can  be  more  natural  than  the  conclusion 
that  he  was  the  leader  in  the  Babelic  transaction,  and  that 
the  project  was  in  great  measure  a  scheme  of  his  for  acquir- 
ing and  retaining  the  mastery  of  the  world  ?  And  was  it  not 
eminently  worthy  of  the  divine  wisdom  and  benevolence, 
benevolence  in  regard  to  the  race,  to  counteract  his  scheme  ? 
a  scheme  which  had  in  it  so  many  and  great  elements  of  evil ; 


THE    CHIEFTAIN    NIMROD. 


339 


and  which,  had  it  been  carried  out  or  consummated,  would, 
without  a  peradventure,  have  proved  so  vastly  prolific  of  ill. 
You  may  have  somewhere  met  with  the  intimation,  as  he 
who  addresses  you  has,  that  at  the  time  of  the  Babel-building 
proceedings,  if  the  birth  of  Peleg  be  regarded  as  represent- 
ing the  date  of  them,  this  man,  Nimrod,  could  not  have 
reached  sufficient  years  to  have  acted  the  part  of  an  instiga- 
tor and  leader  in  them.  Now  while  we  do  not  feel  disposed 
to  express  any  partiality  for  that  so  early  date  —  which,  as 
indicative  of  the  precise  epoch  of  those  proceedings,  may,  we 
think,  be  justly  deemed  quite  problematical,  —  yet  it  appears 
to  us  that  if  this  latter  could  be  proved  exactly  correct,  it 
would  not  thence  necessarily  follow  that  Nlmrod  was  not  and 
could  not  have  been  the  prime  mover  and  master  spirit  in 
those  transactions.  Let  us  see.  You  remember  that  Peleg's 
birth  occurred  the  one  hundred  and  first  year  after  the  flood.* 


*  A  Genealogical  Table  of  Postdiluvian  Patriarchs,  to  the  time  of  Abra- 
ham.    (See  Gen.  11 :  10-26.) 


Born  in  the  year 
of  the  world. 

Age  when  named 
son  born. 

Lived  afterward 
years. 

o 

0)  '—  ' 

o> 

rS 

*! 

1558 

100 

.  500 

600 

2158 

1658 

35 

403 

438 

2096 

Salah,  

1693 

30 

403 

433 

2126 

1723 

34 

430 

464 

2187 

1757 

30 

209 

239 

1996 

1787 

32 

207 

239 

2026 

1819 

30 

200 

230 

2049 

Nahor  ,  

1849 

29 

119 

148 

1997 

1878 

5  70* 

205 

2083 

2008 

I  loO 

175 

2183 

*  The  number  70  indicates  the  age  of  Terah  when  Haran  was  born ;  and 
the  number  130  the  age  of  the  father  at  the  birth  of  Abraham.  The 
reader  may  see  this  explained  near  the  middle  of  Evening  Thirty-first. 


340  THE    CHIEFTAIN    NIMROD. 

In  the  Genealogical  Table  which  has  been  just  handed  you, 
will  you  have  the  goodness,  young  gentlemen,  particularly  to 
note  the  two  following  things  :  First,  The  length  of  life  of 
the  postdiluvians  in  the  Shemitic  line  there  named.  You  will 
observe  that  on  an  average  they  did  not  attain  to  more  than 
about  one  third  of  the  age  of  the  antediluvians.  Secondly, 
Mark  at  what  time  of  life  they  severally  became  parents  from 
Arphaxad  down  to  Nahor,  the  father  of  Terah ;  that  it  was 
from  thirty  to  thirty-Jive  years  of  age  —  that  is,  they  became 
parents  earlier  than  the  antediluvians,  proportionally  to  the 
earlier  occurrence  of  their  decease. 

Now  as  Arphaxad,  the  elder  son  of  Shem,  was  born  two 
years  after  the  flood  (chapter  11  :  10,)  so  may  have  Gush, 
the  elder  son  of  Ham,  (chapter  10 :  6,)  been  born  as  early 
as  two  years  subsequent  to  that  event.  And  as  you  have 
marked  those  Shemites  to  have  become  fathers  at  the  age  of 
from  thirty  to  thirty-five,  so  may  we  believe  Gush,  Ham's 
son,  to  have  commenced  sustaining  the  paternal  relation  in 
equally  early  life,  i.  e.  at  the  age  of  thirty  or  thirty-five  — 
say  the  longer  of  these  two  periods.  You  perceive  that, 
according  to  this,  Nimrod,  had  he  been  the  oldest  son  of 
Gush,  would  have  come  into  the  world  thirty-seven  years 
after  the  flood.  But  instead  of  supposing  Nimrod  to  have 
been  the  eldest  son  of  his  father,  reckon  him  the  sixth  —  the 
names  of  five  other  sons  being  previously  mentioned  (chap- 
ter 10 :  7,  8 ;)  and  admit  an  interval  of  two  years  to  have 
occurred  between  the  births  of  each  two  of  the  several  sons 
—  then,  Nimrod's  birth  would  have  taken  place  forty-seven 
years  posterior  to  the  deluge,  and  fifty-three  or  fifty -four 
years  —  the  latter  properly  —  anterior  to  the  birth  of  Peleg. 
That  is,  at  the  time  of  the  building  of  the  tower,  or  of  the 
division  consequent  on  the  confusion,  Nimrod  was  fifty-four 
years  old  —  at  just  about  such  a  time  of  life  in  which  he 
might  be  naturally  expected  to  be  most  forward  to  launch 
into  an  enterprise  of  the  kind,  in  its  various  characteristics) 
with  that  of  Babel. 


THE    CHIEFTAIN   NIMROD.  341 

The  name  Nimrod  is  from  a  verb  (Tito  marad)  whicli  sig- 
nifies to  rebel,  and  is  quite  descriptive  of  the  character  of  him 
who  bore  it  —  a  man  who  spent  his  life  in  opposition  to  the 
Divine  Will.  As  a  chieftain  or  ruler  he  appears  to  have 
been  ever  actuated  by  desires  and  motives,  ambitious  and  self- 
ish ;  and  so  far  as  he  became,  after  any  manner,  acquainted 
with  the  purposes,  plans,  will,  of  the  Kuler  Supreme,  he 
seems,  in  regard  to  these,  to  have  invariably  put  himself  in 
a  posture  of  resolute  and  daring  antagonism.  This  we  have 
seen  notoriously  exemplified  in  the  affair  recently  contem- 
plated. It  is  probable  that  the  name  Nimrod  was  not  given  this 
"  son  of  rebellion  "  by  his  parents,  but  by  after  ages  as  ex- 
pressive of  his  character.  As  an  opposer  of  patriarchal 
authority  and  a  subverter  of  the  patriarchal  government,  he 
merited  the  descriptive  and  expressive  appellation  by  which 
he  has  been  ever  known  and  designated  since  it  was  first 
applied  to  him.  "  He  began  to  be  a  mighty  one  in  the  earth," 
says  the  sacred  historian  (ch.  10 :  8.)  That  he  became  a 
great  subjugator  and  oppressor  of  his  fellow-men,  has  been 
an  opinion  handed  down  from  generation  to  generation  con- 
cerning him.  That  the  inhuman  practice  of  war,  at  least  in 
the  ages  succeeding  the  flood,  originated  with  this  bold  and 
aspiring  usurper,  is  in  the  highest  degree  probable  : 

"  Proud  Nimrod  first  the  bloody  chase  began, 
A  mighty  hunter  —  and  his  prey  was  man." 

Ancient  testimonies  do  not  even  confine  themselves  to  repre- 
sentations of  him  as  the  first  of  tyrannical  oppressors  of  his 
species,  but  hold  him  forth  as  the  prominent  instigator  of  a 
widespread  apostacy  from  the  faith,  and  defection  from  the 
worship  of  his  patriarchal  ancestry.  Josephus  says  of  him 
that  "  he  was  a  bold  man,  and  of  great  strength  of  hand  ;  and 
that  he  gradually  changed  the  government  into  tyranny, 
seeing  no  other  way  of  turning  men  from  the  fear  of  God 
but  to  bring  them  to  a  constant  dependence  on  his  own 


342          CONCERNING  DATE  OF  EVENTS, 

power."  The  Targum  of  Onkelos  informs  us  that "  he  began  to 
be  a  mighty  man  in  sin,  a  murderer  of  innocent  men,  and  a 
rebel  before  the  Lord."  In  the  Jerusalem  Targum  it  is  said, 
"  he  was  a  hunter  of  the  children  of  men  in  their  lano-uajres, 

O          O         s 

and  he  said  unto  them,  Depart  from  the  religion  of  Shem, 
and  cleave  unto  the  institutes  of  Nimrod."  "When  we  come 
to  speak  of  the  dispersion,  and  somewhat  in  regard  to  what 
followed  it,  we  may  have  occasion  to  drop  a  few  words  addi- 
tional concerning  this  man. 

To  the  not  uncommon  opinion  that  the  birth  of  Peleg,  or 
the  one  hundred  and  first  year  after  the  flood,  is  to  be  viewed 
as  the  proper  era  of  the  confusion  of  tongues,  and  the  com- 
mencement of  the  division  and  resulting  dispersion  of  man- 
kind, objections  may  be  and  have  been  urged ;  and  some  of 
them  are  certainly  not  without  weight.  We  will  specify  only 
two  or  three.  The  first  objection  that  we  will  state  is  not,  we 
think,  the  most  formidable.  It  is  in  substance  this :  —  That 
the  descendants  of  our  postdiluvian  father  could  not,  so  early 
as  the  beginning  of  the  second  century  succeeding  the  deluge, 
have  attained  to  such  numbers  as  that  all,  much  less  a  part, 
of  them  would  have  been  sufficient  to  commence  and  prosecute 
so  magnificent  an  undertaking  as  that  of  building  such  a  city 
and  tower  as  those  of  Babel.  This  objection  does  not  appear 
to  us  insusceptible  of  an  answer.  It  strikes  us  that  something 
like  the  following  might  be  plausibly  set  forth  in  reply:  — 
May  not  an  erroneous  notion  be  conceived,  first,  in  reference 
to  the  magnitude  of  the  Babelic  city  and  tower?  It  is 
evident  that  the  term  city  is  often  employed  in  sacred  history 
to  denote  a  population,  or  cluster  of  edifices,  of  no  great  mag- 
nitude. And  as  to  the  tower,  it  certainly  is  possible  that  it 
may  have  been  no  such  structure,  either  as  to  massiveness  or 
altitude,  as  has  been  very  commonly  conceived.  Quite  a 
mistake  may  be,  and  frequently  is,  committed  by  attaching 
modern  ideas  to  ancient  terms.  In  the  next  place,  an  error 
may  be  fallen  into  concerning  the  numbers  to  which  Noah's 


AMOUNT    OF    POPULATION,   ETC.  343 

descendants  had  attained  at  the  end  of  the  first  century  after 
the  flood,  by  losing  sight  of  two  things  :  —  First ;  the  length 
of  the  period  with  parental  couples,  in  which,  in  that  age  of 
the  world,  the  process  of  procreation  would  ordinarily  continue 
—  which  was  not  merely  some  twenty  to  twenty-five  years,  as 
now ;  but,  on  an  average,  (from  the  time  of  the  deluge  to  that 
of  Peleg,)  ranging  from  one  hundred  to  one  hundred  and  fifty 
years.  Secondly ;  an  error  may  likewise  arise  in  the  mind 
of  the  reader  of  the  genealogical  list  of  Genesis,  tenth  'chapter, 
from  imagining  that  that  list  is  comprehensive  of  all  Noah's 
posterity  so  far  downward  from  the  flood  as  it  professes  to 
extend ;  whereas  it  is  very  far  from  being  so,  as  any  one  may 
perceive  barely  by  noting,  that  in  all  that  roll  there  is  not  to 
be  discovered  the  name  of  an  individual  female.  This,  how- 
ever, is  only  a  part  of  the  omission.  Read,  for  instance,  from 
the  second  to  the  fourth  verse,  inclusive,  and  you  will  find 
that,  while  the  names  of  seven  sons  of  Japheth  are  given, 
there  is  ho  record  of  the  names  of  Japheth's  sons'  sons,  ex- 
cept barely  in  the  case  of  the  two  sons,  Gomer  and  Javan. 
Again ;  look  at  the  names  of  the  sons  of  Gush,  in  the  seventh 
and  eighth  verses.  These  are  six  in  number ;  yet  you  find 
the  names  of  only  two  grandsons.  In  the  twenty-second 
verse,  the  names  of  five  sons  of  Shem  are  mentioned ;  but  no 
mention  is  made  of  children  of  any  of  these  sons,  save  in  the 
case  of  two.  And  that  Noah's  three  sons,  taken  together, 
had  no  more  children  —  no  more  sons  even  —  than  the  six- 
teen that  are  noticed  by  the  historian,  who,  with  the  fact 
before  the  mind  a  moment  ago  adverted  to,  will  imagine  ?  It 
is  recommended  to  you,  in  this  connection,  to  inspect  the  first 
verse  of  the  ninth  chapter.  Doing  this,  and  weighing  at  the 
same  time  the  hints  just  thrown  out,  we  would  not  be  sur- 
prised if  you  should  come  to  the  conclusion  that,  so  early  as 
at  the  beginning  of  the  second  century  after  the  deluge,  the 
posterity  of  our  patriarch  could  not  have  been  numerically 
small  —  and  when  you  recollect,  moreover,  that  none  had  so 


344          CONCERNING  DATE  OF  EVENTS, 

soon  sunk  to  the  tomb  from  tottering  old  age ;  that,  below 
Noah  and  his  wife,  there  were,  at  the  period  of  Peleg's  birth, 
some  four  or  five  generations  together  on  the  earth.  So  far 
as  relates  to  numbers,  then,  there  may  have  existed,  at  the 
period  just  named,  no  deficiency  for  the  execution  of  the 
Babelic  project. 

A  large  proportion  of  these,  however,  be  it  observed,  were 
young  —  at  the  time  of  Peleg's  birth  too  young  —  to  be 
efficient  auxiliaries,  and,  as  to  many  of  them,  auxiliaries  at 
all,  in  the  building  of  the  city  and  tower.  And  here,  in  the 
juvenility,  as  well  as  childhood  and  infancy,  of  so  great  a 
proportion  of  the  Shinarites,  at  the  end  of  a  century  from  the 
flood's  cessation,  may  be  found  both  a  plausible  and  forcible 
objection  against  fixing  the  era  of  the  confusion  and  dispersion 
so  early  as  the  birth  of  Peleg.  Such  a  consideration  may 
itself  prove  so  heavy  a  weight  in  the  scale  as,  with  many  if 
not  all  of  you,  to  cause  a  preponderance  in  favor  of  a  con- 
siderably later  point  of  time  "  in  the  days "  of  this  son  of 
Heber  than  the  earlier  dawn  of  his  being,  for  the  confusion 
of  tongues  ;  for  the  consequent  division  of  mankind  into  many 
distinct  bands ;  and  their  divergence  into  different  and,  in 
numerous  cases,  widely  distant  localities  on  our  globe.  Only 
see  to  it,  that  in  your  anxiety  and  care  to  avoid  Scylla,  you 
do  not  run  upon  Charybdis :  in  other  words,  that,  adhering 
to  the  common  chronology,  you  do  not  fix  on  so  late  a  period 
in  Peleg's  two  hundred  and  thirty-nine  years,  as  to  encroach 
upon  the  season  requisite  for  such  a  settling  of  different 
portions  of  the  world  as  is  known  to  have  occurred  prior  to 
the  time  of  Abraham's  departure  from  Ur  of  the  Chaldees. 

There  may  be  a  supposition  entertained  of  this  sort :  that, 
about  the  time  of  Peleg's  birth,  there  was  a  divinely  appointed 
division  of  the  earth  among  Noah's  offspring;  —  that  God 
then  gave  direction  to  our  patriarch  and  his  three  sons,  after 
some  method,  in  regard  to  it ;  but  that  the  several  families, 


AMOUNT    OF   POPULATION,  ETC.  345 

or  closely  affiliated  branches,  to  which  the  various  regions 
had,  by  divine  appointment,  been  assigned,  did  not  at  once, 
nor  until  years  afterward,  separate,  to  take  possession  of 
them ;  that  either  because  the  time  which  the  Supreme  Dis- 
poser appointed  was  not  the  then  present,  but  lay  at  a  certain 
distance  in  the  future,  or  else  because  of  a  strong,  irrepressible 
desire  of  the  people  to  remain  together,  they  did  not  separate ; 
and  that,  say  a  century  subsequently,  upon  Noah,  seconded 
by  one  or  more  of  his  sons,  urging  a  compliance  with  the 
divine  appointment,  a  bold  and  apparently  ingenious  project 
was  devised  by  Nimrod  with  a  few  coadjutors,  and  favored 
by  the  people  —  the  project  which  has  been  repeatedly 
specified — to  prevent  the  fulfilment  of  the  indicated  will  of 
the  Deity,  the  Infinite  King  interposed  in  the  way  to  which 
our  attention  has  been  directed.  This  would  make  the  epoch 
of  the  actual  division  and  dispersion,  about  two  centuries 
posterior  to  the  deluge, —  a  season  of  adequate  length,  surely, 
not  alone  for  a  great  multiplication  of  our  postdiluvian  father's 
posterity,  but  the  arriving  of  a  large  proportion  of  them  at 
maturity. 


EVENING    TWENTY-SEVENTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

Having  on  a  former  occasion  alluded  to  a  divine  decree  or 
appointment  relative  to  the  earth's  distribution  amongst  the 
progeny  of  our  patriarch,  it  is  proper  to  add,  that  a  prevail- 
ing tradition  of  such  a  decree  existed,  and  is  moreover  thought 
to  be  intimated  both  in  the  Old  and  New  Testament.  Moses, 
it  has  been  believed,  refers  to  it,  in  Deuteronomy  32 :  7-9, 
as  handed  down  to  the  children  of  Israel  "  from  the  days  of 
old,  and  the  years  of  many  generations ;  as  they  might  learn 
from  their  fathers  and  elders ; "  and  further,  as  conveying  to 
that  portion  of  the  Shemites  of  which  Jacob  was  the  more 
immediate  head  —  that  is,  the  twelve  tribes  of  Israel  —  a 
grant  of  the  territory  afterward  known  as  the  land  of  Pales- 
tine, to  be  their  lot.  And,  by  the  way,  this  may  be  regarded 
as  furnishing  one  of  the  proofs  of  the  justice  of  the  expulsion 
of  the  Canaanites,  in  a  subsequent  age,  from  that  land,  as 
usurpers  —  an  expulsion  effected  through  the  instrumentality 
of  the  Israelites,  its  rightful  proprietors,  under  Moses,  Joshua, 
and  their  successors.  Mention  of  the  divine  decree  relating 
to  this  grant  we  find  made  to  Abraham  in  Gen.  15  :  13-21 ; 
and  there  was  a  recapitulation  to  Isaac  and  Jacob.  This 
decree  had  been  made  known  to  the  Ilamites  before  the  Con- 
fusion at  Babel  occurred ;  and  with  it  that  portion  of  them 
must  have  been  acquainted  who  entered  and  were  prime 


REFERENCES    TO    DECREE    OF    DISTRIBUTION.          347 

settlers  in  that  land.  And  may  not  the  knowledge  of  the 
divine  allotment  of  this  territory  to  people  of  the  Shemite 
line,  satisfactorily  account  for  the  extreme  agitation  and  panic 
with  which  the  devoted  nations  of  Canaan  were  struck  at  the 
miraculous  passage  by  the  Israelites  through  the  Red  Sea,  and 
approach  to  their  confines,  so  finely  described  by  the  historian 
in  Exodus  15:  14-16? 

It  is  thought  that  in  Acts  17  :  26,  there  is  reference  by  St. 
Paul,  to  the  same  decree  as  a  well  known  tradition  in  the 
heathen  world,  when,  addressing  the  Athenians,  he  speaks  of 
mankind  as  all  of  "  one  blood,"  race,  or  stock,  "  the  sons  of 
Adam,"  and  of  Noah  in  succession ;  and  of  the  seasons  and 
boundaries  of  their  respective  settlements  as  previously  regu- 
lated by  the  clivine  appointment.  And  this  was  conformable 
to  their  own  geographical  allegory,  that  Chronus,  the  god  of 
time,  divided  the  universe  among  his  three  sons,  allotting  the 
upper  regions  of  the  north  to  Japheth ;  the  maritime  or  mid- 
dle regions  to  Shem;  and  the  lower  regions  of  the  south 
to  Ham. 

In  his  History  of  the  Dynasties,  Abulfaragi  furnishes  a  tra- 
dition that  our  postdiluvian  father  distributed  the  habitable 
earth,  from  north  to  south,  between  his  sons,  and  gave  to 
Ham  the  region  of  the  blacks ;  to  Shem  the  region  of  the 
ta,wny,fuscorum;  and  to  Japheth  the  region  of  the  ruddy, 
rubrorum.  According  to  this  assignment,  all  that  region  em- 
bracing what  afterwards  went  under  the  name  of  Assyria, 
Babylonia,  Syria,  Palestine,  &c.,  fell  to  the  Shemitic  branch 
of  Noah's  posterity.  Whosoever  then,  besides  Shemites, 
should,  under  any  chieftain,  attempt  to  establish  themselves  in 
any  portion  of  this  region,  would  be  guilty  of  rebellion  against 
a  divine  decree  or  appointment,  as  well  as  of  usurpation  of 
what  belonged  of  right  to  others. 

Of  those  writers  who  imagine  that  the  migrating  company, 
indicated  in  the  initial  part  of  the  eleventh  chapter  of  Genesis, 
as  entering  the  plains  of  Shinar,  and  at  so  late  a  day,  too,  as  the 


348  THE    IDEA    OF   A    PREVIOUS     DIVISION. 

chronology  of  the  Septuagint  or  of  Dr.  Hales  will  allow,  con- 
sisted in  large  part  of  Cushites,  more  or  less  believe  that  in 
accordance  with  a  promulgated  decree  of  God  and  under  the 
direction  of  Noah,  a  previous  division  of  the  nascent  popula- 
tion had  taken  place  whilst  they  were  still  somewhere  in  the 
region  of  the  primary  settlement  of  the  Noachidse  after  the 
deluge,  and  probably  at  a  period  marked  by  the  birth  of 
Peleg ;  and  that  the  Arphaxadites,  (of  the  line  of  Shem,)  had 
then  gone  and  taken  possession  of  their  allotted  portion  in  the 
plain  of  the  Euphrates  ;  that  the  Cushites,  under  the  chieftain 
Nimrod,  refusing  to  go  and  occupy  the  territory  assigned 
them,  after  roving  hither  and  thither  for  some  time,  and  col- 
lecting some  of  the  baser  sort  from  other  families,  introduced 
themselves  into  the  plains  of  Shinar ;  made  war  with  and  sub- 
dued or  drove  out  the  Arphaxadites  from  their  rightful  pos- 
session ;  established  themselves  in  their  lot ;  and  devised  and 
partially  executed  a  project  for  preventing  any  future  disper- 
sion of  their  numbers.  This  would  make  the  conduct  of 
Nimrod,  indeed,  and  the  Babelic  confederates  under  him, 
doubly  rebellious  and  flagrant,  and  afford  a  powerful  reason, 
truly,  for  divine  interference  to  overturn  their  scheme  and 
scatter  them.  Yet  such  an  interpretation  of  the  Mosaic 
record  has  appeared  too  remote  from  literality  to  secure  the 
suffrages  of  the  majority  of  distinguished  savans  who  have 
directed  their  investigations  to  this  part  of  sacred  history;- — 
with  whom  it  has  been  a  settled  opinion  that  the  Shinaric 
plains  presented  the  great  centre  whence  proceeded  the  dis- 
tribution of  the  human  race  over  the  face  of  the  globe. 

As  to  particular  and  reliable  information  in  regard  to  the 
dispersion  of  mankind  from  that  great  centre,  we  would  have 
you  expect  little  from  us.  Were  there  no  other  preventive, 
time  itself  would  allow  but  a  glance  at  the  broad  and  difficult 
theme.  If  by  throwing  out  a  few  hints,  however,  we  succeed 
in  exciting  in  you  a  desire  for  further  inquiry,  the  little  that 


THE    DISPERSION    CONSIDERED.  349 

we  have  to  say  will  not  be  laid  before  you  in  vain.     Please 
to  turn  now  to  Genesis  10th  chapter. 

The  separation  which  of  necessity  commenced  among  the 
Shinaric  population,  as  a  consequence  of  the  confusion  of 
tongues,  we  must  not  suppose  was  confusedly  entered  upon. 
The  general  tenor  of  the  chapter,  and  what  is  remarked  in 
the  5th,  20th,  and  31st  verses  in  particular,  forbid  the  just 
entertainment  of  such  an  idea.  The  confusion  affected  inter- 
course and  concert  between  families  and  tribes,  rather  than 
between  individuals  of  the  same  tribe  and  family.  We  have 
good  reason  for  believing  that  members  of  the  same  small 
affiliated  company  found  no  obstacle  of  a  linguistic  nature  in 
the  way  of  free  mutual  intercourse.  By  different  families  or 
groups  the  members  of  which  severally  were  related  by  con- 
sanguinity and  affinity,  arrangements  were  deliberately  made 
to  go  forth  and  occupy  new  homes,  settle  new  and  different 
regions.  The  three  greater  branches  of  Noah's  posterity 
were  not  suffered  to  be  to  a  large  extent  forgetful  of  the  great 
general  divisions  of  the  earth's  surface  which  through  their 
common  progenitor  had  been  divinely  appointed  them  re- 
spectively ;  and,  with  some  exceptions  which  are  not  to  be 
lost  sight  of,  were  caused  to  yield  compliance  with  the  divine 
allotment  —  made  to  direct  their  course,  when  they  moved, 
accordingly.  It  would  be  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  the  do- 
mestic or  social  groups  of  the  various  lines  or  branches 
reached  always  their  place  of  ultimate  destination  speedily. 
In  numerous  cases,  we  may  suppose  that  it  was  after  a  long 
interval  that  this  was  effected.  The  Ruler  over  all  was  not 
severe  in  his  exactions  in  this  respect.  Indeed  he  had  wisely 
and  kindly  appointed  the  " times"  as  well  as  the  " bounds  of 
their  habitation ; "  had  predetermined  the  when  as  well  as  the 
where,  respectively,  of  their  future  and  final  settlement. 
Their  numbers,  their  progressive  increase,  what  pertained  to 
their  means  of  sustenance,  their  convenience,  &c.,  would  all 
16 


350  GEOGRAPHICAL    SETTLEMENT    OF   TRIBES. 

be  taken  into  the  account  by  Infinite  "Wisdom  and  Benevo- 
lence, in  his  sovereign  plans  and  allotments  relative  to  them. 
In  your  inspection  of  the  genealogical  table  of  this  tenth 
chapter,  bear  in  mind,  as  your  eye  runs  over  the  names  there 
given,  that  they  are  not  to  be  regarded  merely  in  an  individ- 
ual capacity ;  but,  for  the  most  part,  as  the  names  of  the 
families,  tribes,  or  nations  descended  from  them ;  just  as 
Judah  and  Israel,  though  names  of  single  persons,  were  also 
the  names  of  whole  nations ;  or  just  as  the  names  of  the 
twelve  sons  of  Jacob  were  likewise  the  names  of  the  twelve 
tribes  of  Israel.  Many  of  the  names  in  this  roll,  indeed,  are 
not  of  the  singular  but  the  plural  number.  All  those  ending 
in  im  are  so,  it  being  the  plural  form  of  the  Hebrew  noun. 
(See  verses  13  and  14.)  Those  ending  in  ite,  you  hardly 
need  be  told,  are  descriptive  of  tribes,  not  of  individuals. 
(See  verses  16-18.)  Indeed  scarcely  a  single  name,  there 
mentioned,  is  to  be  understood  solely  in  an  individual  ca- 
pacity. This-  genealogical  chart  then  possesses  ethnographic 
features,  and  is  a  document,  in  this  respect,  of  no  inconsider- 
able value.  There  is  not  indeed,  at  this  distance  of  time, 
furnished  by  it  all  the  definite  information  which  it  doubtless 
afforded  to  those  who  lived  nearer  the  days  of  Moses.  In 
the  course  of  ages  various  circumstances  would  operate  to 
produce  changes  in  the  names  of  tribes  and  peoples  —  such 
changes  thaft  it  might  at  length  become  difficult  if  not 
altogether  impossible,  where  a  record  of  the  changes  has  not 
been  kept,  (and  what  is  more  common  than  neglect  here  ?)  to 
trace  the  same  people  through  all  the  periods  of  their  ex- 
istence. To  locate  correctly,  by  this  means,  all  the  tribes 
and  peoples  whose  primary  names  are  here  given,  is  a  thing 
therefore  not  to  be  expected.  The  labors  and  researches  of 
such  men  as  Bochart,  LeClerc,  Wells,  Michaelis,  Sir  Wm. 
Jones,  Hales,  Faber,  Gesenius,  Baumgarten,  &c.,  on  the 
subject,  though  unattended,  in  a  large  number  of  instances, 
with  satisfactory  results,  are  nevertheless  not  to  be  lightly 


A.      DESCENDANTS    OF   JAPHETII.  351 

estimated.  Of  these  we  shall  in  a  measure  avail  ourselves 
in  laying  before  you  the  little  upon  the  topic  which  we  have 
on  the  whole  thought  it  best  to  present  to  your  consideration. 
Inquiries,  patient,  untiring,  now  in  the  course  of  prosecution, 
into  the  physical  resemblances,  varieties  and  discrepancies  of 
the  different  portions  of  mankind ;  together  with  a  careful 
and  thorough  examination  and  comparison  of  the  various 
languages  and  dialects  of  the  earth  —  the  study  of  compara- 
tive philology  or  linguistics  (Fr.  linguistique,)  at  present 
prosecuted,  particularly  by  the  German  mind,  with  admirable 
zeal  and  diligence  —  these,  ere  your  youthful  tabernacles 
shall  become  untenanted,  will  probably  afford  you  much  addi- 
tional information,  assisted  by  which  you  will  doubtless  be 
able  materially  to  modify  and  add  gradually  increasing  cor- 
rectness as  well  as  extent  to  what,  with  great  diffidence  and 
hesitancy,  we  are  about  to  submit  to  your  notice.  The 
authorities  consulted  by  us  are  by  no  means  agreed  as  to  the 
geographical  position  of  many  of  the  tribes.  We  shall  con- 
sider them  in  the  order  in  which  they  are  presented  by  the 
sacred  historian. 

A.    DESCENDANTS  OP  JAPHETH.     (Gen.  10 :  2-5.) 

I.  GOMER.  The  Cimmerians  on  the  north  coast  of  the 
Euxine.  Thence  they  spread  west  over  parts  of  Europe : 
the  Celtic  and  Iberian  tribes,  "Welsh,  Gaelic,  Irish,  Breton  ; 
Gauls,  Galatians,  the  Kymzy .  Sons  of  Gomer :  — 

(a).  Ashkenaz.  Axeni,  inhabitants  of  the  southeastern 
coast  of  the  Black  Sea,  where  we  find  a  country  Askania, 
and  a  river  Askanius,  and  a  part  of  Armenia ;  the  Basques 
in  the  north  of  Spain ;  Saxony,  or  perhaps  all  of  Ger- 
many. 

(b).  Riphath.  Rhibii,  east  of  the  Euxine ;  Tobata,  and 
other  parts  of  Paphlagonia;  Croatia;  the  Riphsean  moun- 
tains. 

(c).     Togarmah.    A  province  of  Armenia.     The  Arme- 


352          A.   DESCENDANTS  OF  JAPHETH. 

mans  are  said  to  call  themselves  "  The  house  of  Thorgom." 
The  prophet  Ezekiel  uses  the  same  expression  (Ezek.  38 : 
6;  27:  14). 

II.  MAGOG.     In  Ezekiel  this  appears  to  be  employed  as 
the  name  of  a  country,  and  Gog  that  of  its  chieftain.     The 
Mongoles,  Moguls  ;  the  great  Tartar  nation. 

III.  MADAI.     The  Medes ;  people  of  Iran,  to  whom  the 
Sanscrit  language   belonged ;   primeval  inhabitants  of  Hin- 
doostan. 

IV.  JAVAN.    The  lonians  or  Greeks.    Sons  of  Javan  :  — 
(a).     JElisha.     Greeks  especially  of  the  Peloponesus,  Hel- 
las ;  Elis,  in  which  is  Alisium. 

(b).  Tarshish.  The  east  coast  of  Spain,  where  the  Phoe- 
nicians afterward  planted  their  colony.  Opinions  have  been 
divided  concerning  it. 

(c).  Kittim.  Inhabitants  of  the  isles  and  northern  coasts 
of  the  Mediterranean,  particularly  the  Macedonians  and  the 
Romans,  and  those  farther  to  the  west. 

(d).  Dodanim.  The  [Dodonaei  in  Epirus,  perhaps  in- 
cluding the  lonians.  Dodona,  a  colony  from  which  probably 
settled  at  the  mouths  of  the  Rhone,  Rhodanus.  In  1 
Chron.  1 :  7,  we  read  Rhodanim  (a  permutation  of  D  and  R, 
not  unexampled)  ;  from  which  it  has  been  imagined  that  the 
inhabitants  of  Rhodes  might  perhaps  be  indicated. 

To  the  Javanian  (Ionian)  branch  is  attributed  the  peopling 
of  "  the  isles  of  the  nations,"  (verse  5th.)  The  Hebrew  word 
E^K  isles,  was  used  to  denote  not  only  such  countries  as  are 
surrounded  on  all  sides  by  the  sea,  but  those  also  which  were 
so  situated  in  relation  to  the  Jews,  that  people  could  not  or 
did  not  go  to  or  come  from  them  except  by  water.  Thus  the 
expression  meant  all  countries,  generally,  beyond  sea ;  and 
the  inhabitants  of  such  countries  were  to  the  Jews  "  islanders," 
though  occupying  continental  regions.  The  term  applies, 
therefore,  for  the  most  part,  to  the  countries  west  of  Palestine, 
the  usual  communication  with  which  was  by  the  Mediterra- 


B.       DESCENDANTS    OP   HAM.  353 

nean.     In  a  general  sense  the  expression  may  be  understood 
to  apply  to  Europe  as  far  as  known,  and  to  Asia  Minor. 

B.    DESCENDANTS  OF  HAM.     (Gen.  10 :  6-20.) 

I.  GUSH.  Southwestern  Arabia,  the  modern  province  of 
Jemen;  in  a  more  extended  sense,  Ethiopia,  including 
Southern  Arabia,  and  Ethiopia  in  Africa  south  of  Fgypt. 

Sons  of  Gush :  — 

(a).  Seba.  This  tribe  or  class  is  .probably  referred  to 
Suba,  a  native  name  of  Meroe  upon  the  Nile,  in  the  farthest 
south  of  Egypt,  or  the  beginning  of  Ethiopia. 

(b).  Havilah.  Vestiges  of  this  word  are  found  in  various 
names  of  places  in  Western  Arabia,  and  the  adjacent  parts 
of  Africa.  It  is  quite  distinct  from  the  Havilah  of  Gen. 
2:  11. 

(c).  Saitoh.  Supposed  to  be  situated  in  Arabia,  on  the 
Red  Sea,  probably  in  Gush  or  Arabian  Ethiopia. 

(d).  JKaamah9  JRhegma.  On  the  Arabian  coast  of  the 
Persian  Gulf. 

Two  sons  of  this  Raamah  are  mentioned,  to  wit,  Sheba  and 
Dedan.  Places  of  these  names  we  find  in  the  subsequent 
Scriptures  distinguished  for  trade  and  opulence.  They  both 
lie  in  the  western  part  of  Arabia.  It  was  the  queen  of  this 
Sheba  who  came  to  learn  of  the  wisdom  of  Solomon.  Dedan 
is  not  improbably  considered  as  the  origin  of  Aden,  that  very 
ancient  seaport  and  island  at  the  mouth  of  the  Arabian  Gulf 
or  Red  Sea,  which  has  recently  risen  into  new  importance. 

(e).  Sabtecha.  The  inhabitants  of  the  west  coast  of  the 
Red  Sea,  in  African  Ethiopia. 

(f).  Nimrod,  an  individual.  Besides  Babel,  his  metrop- 
olis, he  built  three  cities  or  towns  in  the  great  plain  of  Shi- 
nar,  viz.  Erech,  Accad,  and  Calneh.  These  have  by  some 
been  conjectured  to  have  been  Aracca  or  Arecha  on  the  Ti- 
gris (some  think  Edessa)  ;  Sacada,  near  the  confluence  of 


354  B.      DESCENDANTS    OF    HAM. 

the  Lycus  and  the  Tigris ;  and  Chalonitis,  afterwards  called 
Ctesiphon.  Upon  these  conjectures  lies  much  obscurity.  If 
Nimrod  did  not  continue  at  Babel  immediately  subsequent  to 
the  Confusion,  he  is  thought  soon,  with  adherents,  to  have 
returned  to  it,  and  made  it  the  capital  of  his  kingdom,  (10th 
verse.) 

As  to  the  import  of  the  llth  verse  there  is  a  difference  of 
opinion.  Some  attempt  to  maintain  that  Asshur,  the  son  of 
Shem,  is  here  meant  to  be  spoken  of,  and  that  it  is  declared 
that  he  went  forth  out  of  the  land  of  Shinar,  and  built  Nin- 
eveh, Rehoboth,  &c.  Others  think  that  in  that  verse  it  is 
meant  to  be  affirmed  that  "  Out  of  that  land  he  (Nimrod) 
went  forth  to  Assyria,"  i.  e.  to  invade  it.  This  is  indeed  the 
marginal  reading  in  our  English  Bible  ;  and  it  is  supported 
not  only  by  such  ancient  authorities  as  the  Targums  of  On- 
kelos  and  Jerusalem,  and  by  Theophilus  and  Jerome  ;  but  by 
such  moderns  as  Bochart,-  Hyde,  Marsham,  Wells,  Le  Chais, 
Faber,  Hales,  Morren,  Clarke,  Scott,  &c.  This  latter  inter- 
pretation is  supported  by  such  reasons  as  the  following :  1st- 
That  it  perfectly  accords  with  Nimrod's  character  to  repre- 
sent him  as  hunting  from  land  to  land  for  the  purpose  of  ex- 
tending his  dominion.  2d.  There  would  be  an  irrelevancy 
in  introducing  Asshur,  the  son  of  Shem,  in  the  midst  of  the 
genealogy  of  Ham.  3d.  The  land  of  Asshur  is  distinguished 
from  "  the  land  of  Nimrod  "  in  the  prophecy  of  Micah,  5 :  6. 
4th.  The  original  word  asn  exivit,  "  went  forth,"  frequent- 
ly denotes  hostile  invasion.  Besides  ;  the  noun  Asshur  is 
often  put  for  the  land  of  Assyria,  (Gen.  2:14;  Num.  24 : 
24,  &c.)  —  It  is,  on  the  other  hand,  true  that  the  textual  ren- 
dering of  the  llth  verse  is  countenanced  by  most  of  the 
ancient  translators,  and  by  Josephus. 

II.  MIZRAIM.  Literally  the  two  Egypts,  the  Upper  and 
the  Lower :  each  was  denominated  Misr,  a  word  even  now 
vernacular  in  that  country.  Of  his  descendants  seven  are 


6.      DESCENDANTS    OF   HAM.  355 

specified  under  plural  names,  some  of  which  are  well  ascer- 
tained. 

(a).  Ludim.  Ludites,  celebrated  as  soldiers  and  archers, 
(Isa.  66:19;  Jer.  46 :  9  ;  Ezek.  27  :  10 ;  30 :  5,)  and  in  those 
passages  connected  with  other  peoples  known  to  be  African. 
The  Ludim,  probably,  lay  toward  Ethiopia.  They  must  not 
be  confounded  with  the  Lydians  of  Asia  Minor. 

(b).  Anamim.  Uncertain ;  by  Bochart  supposed  to  have 
been  wandering  tribes  about  the  temple  of  Jupiter  Ammon, 
where  was  an  ancient  people  called  Nasamones. 

(c).  Lehabim.  Perhaps  inhabitants  of  a  coast  district 
immediately  west  of  Egypt.  Probably  the  Lubim,  (2 
Chron.  12:3;  Nahum  3 :  9.) 

(d).  Pathrusim.  The  people  of  the  Thebaid,  (Pathros,) 
in  Upper  Egypt. 

(e).  "  Casluhim,)  out  of  whom  came  Philistim."  A 
people  on  the  northeast  coast  of  Egypt,  of  whom  the  Philis- 
tines were  a  colony,  probably  combined  with  some  of  the 
Caphtorim. 

(f).  Caphtorim.  Believed  to  have  inhabited  the  island 
Cyprus. 

III.  PHUT.     In  two  or  three  passages  besides,  does  this 
word  occur  —  always  in  connection  with  Africa.     Phutes,  an 
African   river,  is   mentioned   by  Josephus    and   by   Pliny. 
Hitter,  the  great  modern  archaeologist  geographer,  says  that 
hordes  of  peoples  have  been  poured  out  of  Futa,  in  the  interior 
of  Africa. 

IV.  CANAAN.     His   descendants   came   out  of  Arabia, 
planted  colonies  in  Palestine,  and  gradually  possessed  them- 
selves of  the  whole  country. 

His  children  or  posterity :  — 

(a).      Sidon,  his  firstborn,  founded  the  city  of  that  name, 
(b).      JSeth,  the  ancestor  of  the  Hittites.     The  remaining 
nine,  mentioned  in  verses  16-18,  are  laid  down  in  the  singu 


35G  C.      DESCENDANTS    OF   SHEM. 

lar  of  the  patronymic,  or  patrial  adjective.  All  are  assigned 
to  Palestine,  and  the  boundaries  of  the  country  are  precisely 
given. 

C.      DESCENDANTS   OF  SHEM.      (Gen.  10:  21-31.) 

Children  of  Shem:  — 

I.  ELAM.     The  ancestor  of  the  Elamites  or  Elymaeans, 
who  possessed  Elymais,  a  region  between  Susiana  and  Media, 
now  termed  Khusistan.     The  Japhetian  Persians  subsequent- 
ly entered  that  region,  and  gained  the  ascendancy,  and  after- 
ward they  were  comprehended  under  the  name  of  Elam. 

II.  ASSHUR.     The  ancestor  of  the  Assyrians. 

III.  ARPHAXAD.     Though  named  after,  he  was  born 
before  either  of  the  two  preceding.     The  word  is  a  compound, 
and  is  supposed  to  denote  Neighboring  to  the  Chasdim,  i.  e., 
Chaldeans.     The  name  appears  in  Arrapachitis,  a  province 
in  northern  Assyria,  the  primitive  seat  of  the  Chasdim,  and 
near  to  which,  or  in  it,  Abraham  was  born. 

Salah  is  the  only  son  of  Arphaxad  whose  name  is  given ; 
and  the  only  son  of  Salah  mentioned  in  the  genealogical 
list  is 

Eber.  The  important  circumstance  attaching  itself  to  this 
man's  name,  is  that  of  being  the  origin  of  the  name  Ebrew> 
or,  as  it  is  commonly  written,  Hebrew,  the  ancient  and  uni- 
versal name  of  the  nation  or  people  descending  from  him 
through  Abraham. 

Of  Eber,  the  annalist  gives  us  the  names  of  two  sons :  — 

(a).  Peleg.  The  only  important  circumstance  connected 
with  his  name,  of  which  mention  is  made,  has  been  noticed. 

(b).  Joktan.  The  ancestor  of  the  numerous  tribes  of 
Arabs  in  Yemen,  Arabia  Felix  or  Happy  —  which  last  is  so 
called  on  account  of  its  spices  and  other  rich  products,  and  to 
distinguish  it  from  the  Rocky  and  the  Desert.  Of  Joktan 's 


C,      DESCENDANTS    OP    SHEM.  357 

immediate  descendants,  Moses  has  given  us  the  names  of 
thirteen.  These  are  to  be  regarded  as  the  founders  of  the 
tribes  alluded  to,  and  as  affording  them  their  distinctive  ap- 
pellations. These  thirteen  tribes  seem  to  have  formed  the 
confederacy  of  the  independent  and  unconquerable  Arabs, 
whose  peninsular,  desert,  and  mountainous  country  served  as 
a  defence  from  invasion.  In  subsequent  times,  Abraham's 
son  IshmaeFs  descendants  were  united  with  them.  In  the 
thirtieth  verse,  the  phrase,  "  from  Mesha,  as  thou  goest  unto 
Sephar,"  is  intended  to  indicate  their  boundaries.  The 
former  is  probably  the  country  Maishon  or  Mesene,  at  the 
northwest  head  of  the  Persian  Gulf;  and  the  latter,  on  the 
southwest  coast  of  Arabia,  where  is  found  a  mount  Sabber, 
answering,  it  is  thought,  to  the  mount  which  Moses  names. 

IV.  LUD.     From  this  fourth  named  son  of  Shem  the 
Lydians  in  Asia  Minor  derived  their  name. 

V.  ARAM.    From  him  the  inhabitants  of  Syria,  Chalonitis, 
and  a  considerable  part  of  Mesopotamia  derived  their  origin. 
The  Hebrews  gave  the  name  Aram  to  the  tract  of  country 
lying  between  Phenicia  on  the  west,  Palestine  on  the  south, 
Arabia  Deserta  and  the  river  Tigris  on  the  east,  and  the 
mountain   range   of    Taurus    on    the    north.      The   Aram 
Naharaim  of  Scripture  embraces  at  least  the  northern  por- 
tion, and  some  think  the  whole,  of  Mesopotamia.     This  latter 
is  a  less  common  name  in  the  sacred  writings  than  Padan- 
aram,  i.  e.,  plain  of  Aram,  to  denote   the   territory  lying 
between  the  Tigris  and  Euphrates. 

Children  or  posterity  of  Aram :  — 

(a).      Uz.     In   the  northern   part  of,  Arabia,  bordering 
upon  Chaldea :  the  land  of  Job. 

(b).     Hul.     The  large  flat  district  in  the  north  of  Pales- 
tine, through  which  lies  the  initial  course  of  the  Jordan,  even 
now  called  the  land  of  Huleh,  and  in  which  is  the  lake  Huleh, 
anciently  Merom. 
16* 


358  C.      DESCENDANTS    OF    SHEM. 

(c).  Gether.  East  of  Armenia  ;x  Carthara  was  a  city  on 
the  Tigris. 

(d).  Mash.  This  indicates  a  mountain  region,  it  is 
believed,  branching  eastward  from  the  great  ridge  of  the 
Taurus ;  the  Masian  mountains  of  the  Greeks  and  Romans. 

Here  is  concluded  what  we  have  to  say  upon  this  intricate 
and  difficult  subject. 


EVENING    TWENTY-EIGHTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

In  our  last,  we  were  called  to  speak  of  tribes  and  peoples 
who,  consequent  upon  the  disruption  of  the  confederacy  at 
Babel,  went  forth  in  various  directions  from  the  Shinaric 
plains  to  fulfil  the  divine  purpose  in  regard  to  the  colonizing 
of  different  portions  of  the  world.  That  these  migrating 
bands  were  all  descendants  of  Noah,  who  that  receives  the 
writings  of  Moses  as  entitled  to  confidence  will  question  ? 
But,  did  absolutely  all  mankind  descend  from  our  patriarch  ? 
Certain  expressions  here  and  there  employed  by  us  in  pre- 
ceding lectures,  when  speaking  of  this  man,  were  such  that 
the  inference  might  be  drawn,  that  so  we  believed.  It  is  in- 
deed our  opinion  that  every  creature  possessed  of  the  attri- 
butes of  humanity,  now  on  the  earth,  is  consanguineously 
related  to  Noah  —  can  claim  him  as  a  progenitor ;  and  that 
ever  since  the  Flood  there  have  been  but  four  persons  on  the 
globe  whose  descent  was  not  from  him.  These  four  were 
Noah's  wife  and  the  wife  of  each  of  his  three  sons.  Upon 
their  death,  and  ever  since,  the  globe  has  been  occupied  ex- 
clusively by  his  progeny. 

So  believe  not  all.  Even  recently,  and  from  a  distinguished 
naturalistic  source,  has  there  been  not  a  prime  announcement 
indeed,  but  a  confident  repromulgation  of  a  doctrine  with 
which  this  is  not  in  harmony.  We  shall  continue  holding  to 


360  DESCENT    OF   ALL    MANKIND    FROM   NOAH  ; 

our  tenet,  however,  until  we  discover  such  reasons  for  its 
repudiation  as  appear  to  us  irresistible.  We  derived  it  pri- 
marily from  certain  declarations  of  the  archaic  historian. 
Apart  from  what  is  embraced  in  that  portion  of  bis  annals 
relating  to  times  prior  to  the  Flood,  we  understand  Moses  as 
teaching  that  absolutely  all  the  antediluvians  who  were  living 
at  the  very  commencement  of  the  Deluge,  perished  in  the 
waters,  save  the  eight  persons  that  entered  the  ark.  What 
else  can  he  be  reasonably  understood  as  asserting  in  Genesis 
7 :  21-23  ?  Those  minatory  declarations,  too,  contained  in 
Genesis  6 :  7,  13,  and  17,  if  fulfilled  —  what  else  can  they  be 
believed  to  teach?  And,  then,  how  shall  we  interpret  9  : 19, 
but  as  presenting  the  idea  that  the  postdiluvian  world  was 
peopled  exclusively  by  Noah's  three  sons  ?  And  what  inter- 
pretation shall  we  give  to  the  words,  "  to  keep  seed  alive  upon 
the  face  of  all  the  earth,"  Genesis  7  :  3,  but  as  assigning  a 
reason  for  the  aggregate  command  given  to  our  magnate  in 
the  preceding  part  of  that  chapter  ?  And  if  we  have  mis- 
taken Moses  as  to  these  testimonies,  then  so  the  apostle 
Peter  appears  likewise  to  have  done.  For,  speaking  of  the 
ark  of  Noah  (1  Peter  3 :  20,)  he  says,  "  wherein  few,  that 
is,  eight  souls  were  saved  by  water."  Does  he  not  seem  to 
think  that  of  the  absolute  totality  of  mankind,  only  the  eight 
persons  who  were  in  the  ark  were  preserved  from  drowning  ? 
And  so,  very  generally,  have  those  readers  who  had  a  rever- 
ence for  the  Sacred  Scriptures,  believed  —  even  those  of  them 
who  did  not  believe  in  the  complete  universality  of  the  deluge 
—  yes,  Dr.  Pye  Smith,  even,  who  imagined  the  flood  of  Noah 
to  have  been  confined  to  a  comparatively  small  part  of  the 
globe. 

As  for  ourselves,  we  shall  consider  it  sufficiently  early  to 
reject  the  testimony  of  Moses  in  regard  to  the  occurrence  of 
such  an  event  as  what  is  called  the  Noachian  Deluge ;  or  to 
understand  its  effects  upon  mankind  to  have  been  less  exten- 
sive than  the  language  of  that  writer  which  lias  been  referred 


OR  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  RACES.      361 

to  seems  to  indicate ;  or  else  to  believe  —  what  may  be  justly 
regarded  as  a  rare  and  not  very  demonstrable  dogma  —  that 
since  the  Noachic  cataclysm,  the  Almighty  has  created  some 
new  pairs  or  races  of  human  creatures  and  located  them  on 
different  parts  of  the  earth's  surface. 

In  addition  to  the  Mosaic  testimony  just  ad  verted  to  in  sup- 
port of  the  tenet  to  which  we  hold,  we  would  remind  you  of 
the  evidence  in  its  favor  which  is  yielded  by  the  traditions  of 
different  nations  respecting  the  Noachic  deluge,  of  which  we 
made  mention  on  the  Eighth  and  Ninth  Evenings.  This  last 
evidence  itself  is  such  as  cannot  very  easily  be  set  aside. 

What,  you  may  ask,  is  urged  in  support  of  that  antago- 
nistic position  that  all  mankind  cannot  have  proceeded  from 
a  common  centre,  or  from  one  paternal  or  ancestral  source  ? 
We  cannot  go  into  detail.  A  general  declaration  of  a  justly 
celebrated  naturalist  of  our  day  is  :  "  Men  were  primitively 
located  in  the  various  parts  of  the  world  they  inhabit ;  and 
they  arose  everywhere  in  those  harmonic  proportions  with 
other  living  beings,  which  would  at  once  secure  their  preserva- 
tion, and  contribute  to  their  welfare."  This  is  followed  with 
the  remark  that,  "  To  suppose  all  men  originated  from  Adam 
and  Eve  is  to  assume  that  the  order  of  creation  has  been 
changed  in  the  course  of  historic  time,  and  to  give  to  the 
Mosaic  record  a  meaning  that  it  was  never  intended  to  have." 
For  this  and  similar  declarations,  see  Christian  Examiner,  of 
July,  1850,  pp.  137-139. 

We  must  be  permitted,  with  all  due  deference,  humbly  to 
say  in  general  to  this :  Whatever  may  be  regarded  or  shown 
to  be  true  of  the  several  portions  of  the  inferior  animals, 
man  is  eminently  a  cosmopolite.  He  is  so  through  the 
physical  susceptibilities  and  the  reason  with  which  his  Creator 
has  endowed  him.  Everywhere  a  domestic  animal  —  he 
leaves  his  footprints  on  the  snows  of  the  polar  regions  ;  he 
basks  on  the  burning  plains  of  the  torrid  zone  ;  as  well  as 
regales  himself  and  flourishes  in  temperate  climes.  He  rears 


362     DESCENT  OP  ALL  MANKIND  FROM  NOAH: 

his  cottage  on  earth's  loftier  elevations,  as  well  as  secures  a 
home  in  her  deeper  vales.  His  constitution  may  become 
adapted  to  the  localities  or  proximities  of  malarious  fens ; 
and  he  may  be  seen  reposing  on  the  oases  of  the  thrice  siccid, 
sandy  desert.  His  geographical  range  is  no  less  than  the 
broad  earth ;  he  can  live  and  move  literally  everywhere  on 
the  surface  of  this  planet.  The  human  animal  is  remarked 
by  Dr.  Paley  to  be  the  only  one  which  is  naked,  and  the  only 
one  which  can  clothe  itself.  This  is  one  of  the  properties 
which  renders  him  an  animal  of  all  climates  and  of  all  sea- 
sons. He  can  adapt  the  lightness  of  his  covering  to  the 
temperature  of  his  abode.  Had  he  been  born  with  a  fleece 
upon  his  back,  although  he  might  have  been  comforted  by  its 
warmth  in  high  latitudes,  it  would  have  oppressed  him  by  its 
weight  and  heat  as  the  species  spread  toward  the  equator. 
He  is  withal  so  wellnigh  omnivorous  a  creature  that  he  need 
be  compelled  nowhere  to  endure  starvation  through  a  want 
of  means  essential  to  his  sustenance.  If  science  may  ascer- 
tain and  talk  of  distinct  "  zoological  provinces,"  let  not  the 
phraseology  be  considered  appropriate  to  the  human  kind. 
There  is  no  essential  connection  between  any  one  .portion  of 
the  globe  and  the  portion  of  humanity  specially  occupying  it. 
Look  at  the  aboriginal  American  —  actually  occupying  all 
latitudes.  The  undivided,  entire  earth  is  the  one  proper 
province  of  man. 

The  argument  on  which  antagonists  principally  rely  in 
their  onset  against  the  doctrine  of  the  unity  of  the  human 
races  as  to  original  paternity,  is  the  number  and  marked  char- 
acter of  the  existing  varieties.  These  are  alleged  to  be  so 
broad,  as  well  as  permanent  and  ancient,  as  to  impel  to  the 
conclusion  that  one  man,  as  Noah,  could  not  have  been  the 
genital  ancestor  of  all.  These  varieties  naturalists  have 
made  attempts  to  classify.  We  have  not  much  faith,  we  ac- 
knowledge, in  those  lines  of  demarcation  which  they  have 
essayed  to  assign,  since  they  are  far  from  agreeing  among 


THE    CAUCASIAN   VARIETY.  3G3 

themselves ;  and  since,  as  Dr.  Bachraan  (in  his  Doctrine  of 
the  Unity,  p.  170)  observes,  there  would  be  more  varieties 
that  c^uld  not  conveniently  be  forced  into  either  race  than  in 
the  individuals  that  compose  the  races  themselves.  The 
more  generally  adopted  classification,  perhaps,  is  that  of 
Blumenbach.  This  distinguished  naturalist  distributes  the 
genus  "homo"  into  the  Caucasian,  Mongolian,  Ethiopian, 
American,  and  Malay  varieties.  The  Caucasian  he  regards 
as  the  primitive  stock.  It  deviates  into  two  extremes,  name- 
ly, the  Mongolian  on  one  side,  and  the  Ethiopian  on  the 
other.  The  two  other  varieties  hold  the  middle  places  be- 
tween the  Caucasian  and  the  two  extremes  ;  that  is,  the 
American  (aboriginal)  comes  in  between  the  Caucasian  and 
Mongolian ;  and  the  Malay  between  the  Caucasian  and 
Ethiopian. 

The  marks  and  descriptions  serving  to  define  these  five 
varieties  of  Blumenbach,  are  given  in  Dr.  Lawrence's  Lec- 
tures on  Man,  pp.  376-390.  "We  cannot  refrain  from  laying 
before  you  the  following  abstract : 

I.  CAUCASIAN  VARIETY.  Characters.  A  white  skin, 
either  with  a  fair  rosy  tint,  or  inclining  to  brown ;  red  cheeks ; 
hair  black,  or  of  the  various  lighter  colors.  Irides  dark  in 
those  with  brown  skin,  light  in  the  fair  or  rosy  complexioned. 
Large  cranium  with  small  face  ;  the  upper  and  anterior  re- 
gions of  the  former  particularly  developed ;  and  the  latter 
falling  perpendicularly  under  them.  Face  oval  and  straight, 
with  features  distinct  from  each  other ;  expanded  forehead, 
narrow  and  rather  aquiline  nose,  and  small  mouth ;  front 
teeth  of  both  jaws  perpendicular ;  lips,  particularly  the  lower, 
gently  turned  out ;  chin  full  and  rounded.  Moral  feelings 
and  intellectual  powers  most  energetic,  and  susceptible  of  the 
highest  development  and  culture. 

The  name  of  this  variety  is  derived  from  Mount  Caucasus, 
because  in  its  neighborhood,  and  particularly  towards  the 
south,  a  very  beautiful  race  of  men,  the  Georgians,  are  met 


364  THE    MONGOLIAN    VARIETY. 

with  ;  and  because  the  more  common  opinion  has  been,  that 
the  original  abode  of  postdiluvian  man  was  near  that  quarter. 

In  this  variety  are  included  all  the  ancient  and  modern 
Europeans  except  the  Laplanders  and  the  rest  of  the  Finnish 
race  ;  the  descendants  of  Europeans,  of  course,  in  the  United 
States  and  other  parts  of  the  Western  Continent ;  the  former 
and  present  inhabitants  of  Western  Asia,  as  far  as  the  river 
Ob,  the  Caspian  Sea,  and  the  Ganges ;  that  is,  the  Assyrians, 
Medes,  and  Chaldaeans;  the  Sarmatians,  Scythians,  and 
Parthians  ;  the  Philistines,  Phoenicians,  Jews,  and  the  inhab- 
itants of  Syria  generally ;  the  Tartars,  properly  so  called ; 
the  several  tribes  actually  occupying  the  chain  of  Caucasus ; 
the  Georgians  (as  we  said),  Circassians,  Mingrelians,  Arme- 
nians ;  the  Turks,  Persians,  Arabians,  Afghans,  and  Hindoos 
of  high  caste  ;  the  northern  Africans,  including  not  only  those 
north  of  the  Great  Desert,  but  even  some  tribes  placed  in 
more  southern  regions;  the  Egyptians,  Abyssinians,  and 
Guanches. 

II.  MONGOLIAN  VARIETY.  This  is  characterized  by  olive 
color,  which  in  many  cases  is  ve'ry  light,  and  black  eyes ; 
black,  straight,  strong  and  thin  hair ;  little  or  no  beard ;  head 
of  a  square  form,  with  small  and  low  forehead ;  broad  and 
flattened  face,  with  the  features  running  together ;  the  glabella 
flat  and  very  broad ;  nose  small  and  flat ;  rounded  cheeks 
projecting  externally ;  narrow  and  linear  aperture  of  the  eye- 
lids ;  eyes  placed  very  obliquely ;  slight  projection  of  the 
chin ;  large  ears ;  thick  lips.  The  stature,  particularly  in 
the  countries  near  the  North  Pole,  is  inferior  to  that  of 
Europeans. 

In  it  are  included  the  numerous  more  or  less  rude,  and  in 
great  part  nomadic  tribes,  which  occupy  central  and  northern 
Asia ;  as  the  Mongols,  Calmucks,  and  Burats,  the  Montchoos 
or  Mandshurs,  Daourians,  Tungooses,  and  Coreans ;  the 
Samoiedes,  Yukagirs,  Coriacks,  Tschutski,  and  Kamtscha- 
dales ;  the  Chinese  and  Japanese ;  the  inhabitants  of  Thibet 


ETHIOPIAN,   AMERICAN,    AND    MALAY.  365 

and  Bootan,  those  of  Tongquin,  Cochin  China,  Ava,  Pegu, 
Cambodia,  Laos  and  Siam ;  the  Finnish  races  of  northern 
Europe,  as  the  Laplanders ;  and  the  tribes  of  Esquimaux  ex- 
tending over  the  northern  parts  of  America,  from  Bhering's 
Strait  to  the  extremity  of  Greenland. 

III.  ETHIOPIAN  VARIETY.     The  skin  anil  eyes  black ; 
the  hair  black  and  woolly ;  the  skull  compressed  laterally  and 
elongated  towards  the  front ;  the  forehead  low,  narrow,  and 
slanting ;  the  cheek  bones  prominent ;  the  jaws  narrow  and 
projecting;  the  upper  front  teeth  oblique;  the  chin  receding. 
The  eyes  are  prominent ;  the  nose  broad,  thick,  flat,  and  con- 
fused with  the  extended  jaw ;  the  lips,  and  particularly  the 
upper  one,  thick.     In  many  instances  the  knees  turn  in. 

All  the  natives  of  Africa,  not  included  in  the  first  variety, 
belong  to  this. 

IV.  AMERICAN  VARIETY.     Characterized  by  a  dark  skin, 
of  a  more  or  less  red  tint ;  black,  straight,  and  strong  hair, 
small  beard,  which  is  generally  eradicated,  and  a  countenance 
and  skull  very  similar  to  those  of  the  Mongolian  tribes.    The 
forehead  is  low,  the  eyes  deep,  the  face  broad,  particularly 
across  the  cheeks,  which  are  prominent  and  rounded.     Yet 
the  face  is  not  so  flattened  as  in  the  Mongols ;  the  nose  and 
other  features   being    more   distinct  and  projecting.     The 
mouth  is  large,  and  the  lips  rather  thick.     The  forehead  and 
vertex  are  in  some  cases  deformed  by  art. 

This  variety  includes  all  the  Americans  (aboriginal)  with 
the  exception  of  the  Esquimaux. 

V.  MALAY  VARIETY.     Brown  color,  from  a  light  tawny 
tint,  not  deeper  than  that  of  the  Spaniards  and  Portuguese,  to 
a  deep  brown  approaching  to  black.     Hair  black,  more  or 
less  curled,  and  abundant.     Head  rather  narrow ;  bones  of 
the  face  large  and  prominent ;  nose  full  and  broad  towards 
the  apex ;  mouth  large. 

To  this  division  belong  the  inhabitants  of  the  peninsula  of 
Malacca,  of  Sumatra,  Java,  Borneo,  Celebes,  and  the  adja- 


36G     DESCENT  OP  ALL  MANKIND  FROM  NOAH  ; 

cent  Asiatic  islands ;  of  the  Molucca,  Ladrone,  Philippine, 
Marian,  and  Caroline  groups ;  of  New  Holland,  Van  Die- 
man's  Land,  New  Guinea,  New  Zealand,  and  the  numberless 
islands  scattered  through  the  whole  of  the  South  Sea.  It  is 
called  Malay,  because  most  of  the  tribes  speak  the  Malay 
language ;  which  may  be  traced,  in  the  various  ramifications 
of  this  race,  from  Madagascar  to  Easter  Island. 

Such,  young  gentlemen,  are  the  varieties  as  to  configura- 
tion, complexion,  etc.,  of  mankind.  They  are  striking. 
Could  all  they  among  whom  so  many,  and,  as  to  the  extremes 
especially,  so  great  varieties  exist,  have  proceeded  from  one 
stock  ?  Is  it  credible  ? 

We  will  introduce  whatever  will  be  offered  by  us  in 
reply,  with  the  declaration,  if  not  of  a  great  naturalist,  at 
least  of  a  great  man,  and  one  who  was  not  accustomed  to 
speak  at  random.  Addressing  a  body  of  sages  at  Athens, 
there  fell  from  his  lips  this  sentence :  "  God  hath  made  of  one 
Mood  all  nations  of  men,  to  dwell  on  all  the  face  of  the  earth." 
Acts  17 :  26.  The  statement  is  not  so  obscure  as  to  need 
explanation  or  comment.  "We  have  been  accustomed  to  listen 
with  respect  and  confidence  to  the  declarations  of  this  man  in 
regard  to  other  matters,  and  we  can  discover  no  good  reason 
why  we  should  not  also  as  to  this. 

At  the  outset  of  what  we  ourselves  have  to  say  in  answer  to 
the  interrogatory  just  stated,  the  following  remark  will  be 
found  true :  There  is  a  wide  distinction  between  man,  in  all  his 
varieties,  and  all  other  animals.  Betwixt  them  there  lies  a 
boundary  so  broad  that  no  Lamarck,  with  all  the  ingenuity  he 
may  think  himself  to  possess,  can  get  his  monads,  or  even  any 
larger  and  more  active  kind  of  animal,  over  it.  The  boundary 
may  be  safely  declared  to  be  utterly  impassable.  There  is  an 
immense  remove  of  human  from  all  other  creatures  beneath 
the  sun.  Let  it  be  observed,  in  the  next  place,  that  great 
and  surprising  as  we  have  seen  the  varieties  among  the 
human  kind  to  be  —  there  are,  on  the  other  hand,  remarkable 


OR  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  RACES.      367 

resemblances  between  all  the  several  portions  of  them — notable 
uniformity  amidst  the  variety.  Having  specified  the  varieties, 
it  would  not  be  right  to  suffer  the  resemblances  to  pass  without 
some  notice. 

With  particular  reference  to  this  point,  then,  let  us  take  a 
glance  at  man's  osseous  structure.  Besides  the  teeth,  there 
are  two  hundred  and  eight  bones  in  the  human  frame.  In 
every  "  race  "  or  variety,  however  widely  separated,  there  are  to 
be  found  the  same  number  of  bones.*  There  is  a  peculiarity 
in  the  breast  bone  :  that  is,  in  infancy  it  has  eight  pieces  ;  in 
youth  three ;  in  old  age  but  one.  This  is  true  alike  in  regard 
to  all  the  "  races."  The  cranium  is  composed  of  eight  bones ; 
each  ear  has  four  small  bones ;  the  face  fourteen.  No  differ- 
ence is  to  be  discovered,  in  these  particulars,  among  the 
different  portions  of  mankind.  The  trunk  has  fifty-four 
bones ;  the  spinal  column  is  composed  of  twenty-four  ver- 
tebrae or  pieces  of  bone.  The  resemblance  here  is  perfect 
amongst  men  everywhere.  The  phalanges  of  the  fingers 
have  three  ranges  of  bones ;  the  thumb  but  two.  The  bones 
of  the  foot,  tarsal  and  metatarsal,  are  in  the  human  creature 
peculiar  —  he  differs  in  this  respect  from  every  other  creature 
on  the  globe.  As  to  dentition  there  is  a  peculiarity  among  the 
human  kind.  There  is  a  set  of  temporary  teeth,  twenty  in 
number,  possessed  in  infancy  or  childhood.  Between  the 
years  of  six  and  fourteen,  these  drop  out  and  are  replaced  by 
thirty-two  permanent  teeth.  In  these  several  respects,  what 
is  true  of  any  one  part  of  mankind  is  true  of  all. 

Let  us  next  glance  at  man's  physiological  organism.  The 
number  and  arrangement  of  the  muscles  are  similar  in  all 
human  bodies.  In  the  digestive,  circulatory,  secretory,  and 
respiratory  organs,  no  difference  has  been  detected  amongst 

*  If  differences  have  been  detected  in  the  number  of  vertebrse  in  indi- 
viduals—  occasionally  a  rib  more  or  less  than  the  usual  number  —  these 
differences  were  found  principally  to  exist  in  different  individuals  of  the 
white  race. 


368     DESCENT  OP  ALL  MANKIND  FROM  NOAH; 

the  diversities  of  men.  The  temperature  of  the  body,  more- 
over, is  the  same  in  all ;  or  at  least  there  is  no  more  difference 
here,  between  the  five  varieties  of  mankind,  than  is  discernible 
among  individuals  of  the  same  variety.  Again :  There  is  that 
beautiful  mechanism,  the  larynx  —  peculiar  to  the  human 
creature,  and  affording  him  the  priceless  power  of  speech  and 
of  song.  This  complicated  and  mysterious  structure  will, 
upon  examination,  be  discovered  to  be,  amongst  all  the 
physical  phases  of  humanity,  identical.  Everywhere,  man 
has  the  power  of  affording  to  the  products  of  his  mind  a 
verbal  vehicle,  and  of  pouring  forth  from  his  lips  melodious 
strains.  —  Numerous  physical  similarities  might  be  added  to 
those  already  mentioned  —  of  which,  however,  we  will  only 
specify  these  three :  The  human  creature,  wherever  found,  is 
bimanous  ;  of  smooth  skin ;  and  of  erect  posture. 

The  different  species  of  sub-human  mammalia  exhibit  pecu- 
liarities in  the  period  of  gestation ;  in  the  number  of  their 
young ;  in  the  time  of  arriving  at  maturity ;  and  in  the  term 
of  life.  If  mankind  were  composed  of  a  variety  of  species, 
instead  of  varieties  of  one  and  the  same  species,  we  might 
expect  among  them  to  find  an  absence  of  uniformity  or  resem- 
blance here.  But  in  all  the  races  or  varieties  of  men,  there 
is  a  general  uniformity  in  these  several  respects. 

All  the  human  races,  the  lowest  among  them  not  excepted, 
evince  the  possession  of  the  power  of  reasoning  and  of  com- 
bination, and  after  methods  strikingly  distinguishing  them 
from  all  the  other  tribes  of  living  things.  As  in  other  ways, 
witness  its  manifestation  in  regard  to  the  uses  of  fire;  in 
reference  to  a  resort  to  artificial  apparel ;  and  in  the  construc- 
tion of  advancingly  commodious  or  comfortable  habitations. 
As  to  instincts  ;  as  to  the  wondrous  capability  of  recognizing 
moral  distinctions ;  and  as  to  the  upspringing  and  elative 
hope  of  immortality,  may  be  observed  a  notable  likeness  in 
universal  manhood,  as  well  as  a  broad  distinction  in  its  every 
phase  between  it  and  all  the  inferior  forms  of  life.  We  will 


OR  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  RACES.      369 

name  but  this  additional  feature  of  resemblance  to  be  marked 
amongst  all  the  families  of  man.  It  is  the  capacity  of  in- 
definite improvement  as  to  their  mental  and  moral  powers. 

Now  such  being  the  resemblances  found  among  universal 
mankind,  we  may  ask  with  emphasis,  what  good  reason  have 
any  —  on  any  principles  of  science,  what  grounds  —  to  deny 
their  common  origin  ? 

We  proceed  to  another  argument.  No  word  in  our  lan- 
guage, perhaps,  is  more  loosely  used  than  species;  and  in  the 
scientific  world  various  have  been  the  definitions  given  to 
it  —  definitions,  in  many  cases,  framed  apparently  to  suit 
favorite  theories.  What,  in  zoology,  is  a  species  ?  One  of 
the  first  ethnologists  of  the  day,  Dr.  Latham,  in  his  Natural 
History  of  the  Varieties  of  Man,  tells  us  that  u  a  species  is  a 
class  of  individuals,  each  of  which  is  hypothetically  considered 
to '  be  the  descendant  of  the  same  protoplast,  or  of  the  same 
pair  of  protoplasts."  We  can  perceive  no  valid  objection  to  this 
statement.  A  species  of  living  things,  then,  is  such  a  tribe, 
or  portion  of  them,  as  have  descended  from  the  same  original 
stock  or  parentage.  Now  nature  (as  we  say),  does  nothing 
in  vain.  The  specific  distinctions  to  which  she  has  given  rise 
in  animated  existence,  have  their  uses.  They  serve  for  the 
safety,  convenience,  and  comfort  of  sub-human  tribes ;  and,  in 
reference  to  those  inferior  forms  of  organic  life,  they  answer 
not  dissimilar  ends  to  man.  They  are  fixed;  and  how  im- 
mensely important  it  is,  that  they  should  be  so.  We  speak 
of  strictly  specific  distinctions.  If  they  could,  through  coition, 
be  extensively  interfered  with  —  if  by  intermixtures  indefinite- 
ly they  might  be  confounded  —  all  the  lines  of  demarcation 
which  were  primarily  drawn,  if  these  could  be  effaced  —  we 
will  not  essay  to  conjecture  the  evils  or  mischiefs  which  would 
ensue;  how  numerous,  diversified,  and  great  monstrosities, 
even,  might  be  the  consequence.  Nature  —  such  is  the  com- 
mon, though  not  unobjectionable,  mode  of  expression — we  use 
it  because  it  is  common,  meaning  properly  by  it  the  God  of 


370     DESCENT  OF  ALL  MANKIND  FROM  NOAH  ; 

nature  —  Nature  has,  therefore,  seen  to  it,  that  this  shall  not 
happen.  She  has  taken  care  to  raise  an  effectual,  impassable 
barrier  to  such  an  occurrence.  This  is  twofold.  First,  she 
has  produced  between  the  different  species  a  strong,  invincible 
repugnance  to  union.  Secondly  —  and  this  is  what  we  wish 
specially  to  be  noted  —  she  has  imparted  to  each  species  an 
organization  so  peculiar  to  itself,  as  to  render  it  impracticable 
for  creatures  of  any  two  species  to  originate  a  new  one.  By 
some  of  the  species,  most  nearly  approximating  each  other 
organically,  individual  hybrids  may,  by  forced  copulation,  be 
engendered ;  but  hybrids  are  infertile ;  there  is  not  the  capa- 
city among  them  of  a  permanent  reproduction  of  their  kind. 
This  doctrine  of  the  general  sterility  of  hybrids  —  this  inca- 
pability among  them  to  perpetuate  their  kind,  or  form  new 
species,  there  have  indeed  been  efforts  put  forth,  and  by  some 
quite  respectable  naturalists,  to  overthrow ;  but  we  cannot  say 
of  them,  that  they  have  been  as  successful  as  they  have  been 
strenuous  and  earnest.  Indeed  we  think,  by  the  justly  cele- 
brated Dr.  Bachman,  in  particular,  in  his  Unity  of  the  Human 
Race,  the  doctrine  just  named  has  been  shown  to  be  insuscep- 
tible of  overthrow.  This  author's  treatise  we  hope  you  may 
soqn  consult,  with  the  view  of  satisfying  your  minds  on  this 
point. 

Now  for  an  application  of  the  doctrine  to  the  interesting 
and  important  question  before  us.  Reasoning  from  analogy 
we  are  constrained  to  infer  that  if  among  mankind  there 
existed  strictly  specific  diversities  —  if  in  regard  to  tribes,  or 
portions,  or  if  you  please,  races,  of  them  a  plurality  of  an- 
cestral origin  were  predicable,  then  so  far  as  copulative  asso- 
ciation with  each  other  should  result  in  the  production  of 
offspring,  the  latter  would  be  infertile ;  the  incapability  of 
permanent  reproduction  would  be  found  existing.  Now  what 
is  the  fact  ?  Who  needs  to  be  informed  of  the  universal  and 
permanent  fertility  of  the  different  races  mutually  associating  ? 
The  Caucasian,  Mongolian,  African,  Malay,  and  aboriginal 


OR  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  RACES.      371 

American,  associationallj  afford  us"  ample  evidence  of  such 
being  the  fact.  On  the  confines  of  Asia,  Africa,  and  Europe, 
many  new  intermediate  races  have  been  thus  produced  —  all 
fertile  in  their  generations,  and  in  their  various  copulative 
interminglings.  "  Within  the  last  two  hundred  years,  a  new 
race  has  sprung  up  in  Mexico  and  South  America,  between 
one  branch  of  the  Caucasian  and  the  native  Indian,  together 
with  no  small  admixture  of  African  blood.  In  the  United 
States,  whose  first  permanent  settlement  commenced  in  Vir- 
ginia, in  1607,  the  two  extremes  of  African  and  Caucasian 
have  met  and  produced  an  intermediate  race."  (Jlachman.) 
Malte-Brun,  speaking  of  the  Portuguese  in  Africa,  says  : 
"  The  Rio  South  branch  is  inhabited  by  the  Maloes,  a  negro 
race,  so  completely  mingled  with  the  descendants  of  the 
original  Portuguese  as  not  to  be  distinguished  from  them." 
There  is  a  large  and  growing  tribe  in  South  Africa,  called 
the  Griqua,  on  Orange  river,  who  are  a  mixture  of  the  origi- 
nal Dutch  settlers  and  the  Hottentots.  To  this  we  have  the 
testimony  of  respectable  writers.  Ample  proof  is  not  want- 
ing that  no  organic  bar  to  productive  sexual  intercourse  ex- 
ists between  the  several  varieties.  We  hesitate  not  indeed 
to  affirm  it  as  a  truth  that  no  fact  is  more  fully  or  satisfac- 
torily established  than  that  all  "  the  races  "  of  human  kind 
produce  in  perpetuity  an  intermediate  and  fertile  progeny. 
The  inference  is,  that  they  all  belong  to  one  species  —  have 
their  descent  from  the  same  original  stock. 


EVENING    TWENTY-NINTH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

Opponents  of  the  doctrine  that  universal  mankind  have 
the  same  original  paternity,  or  are  of  the  same  species,  insist 
that  it  cannot  so  be,  on  account  of  the  diversities  as  to  con- 
figuration and  complexion  known  to  exist  among  the  human 
"races."  But  is  diversity  in  these  respects  evidential  of 
specific  difference  ?  Is  all  variety  to  be  regarded  as  specific  ? 
Look  at  the  lower  animals.  Does  one  and  the  same  species 
amongst  them  exhibit  no  varieties  ?  Were  it  so,  a  strong 
argument  might  thence  be  analogically  derived,  that  man- 
kind, if  all  of  a  common  species  or  origin,  should  manifest 
identity  of  feature  and  color  throughout  the  whole  range  of 
them.  Then,  diversities  showing  themselves,  so  far,  numeri- 
cally, as  they  made  their  appearance,  would  be  the  number 
of  the  species  or  original  stocks  whence  they  proceeded.  But 
who  so  wild  as  to  contend  for  such  a  thing  ?  On  examining 
the  lower  tribes  we  find  in  the  same  species,  or  in  those 
known  to  have  descended  from  the  same  original  stock,  a 
tendency  to  assume  diversities  both  as  to  feature  and  color. 
The  bare  fact  then  that  diversities  in  these  respects  exist 
among  the  families  of  man  does  not  of  itself  show  an  ab- 
sence of  identity  in  origin.  God  has  ordained  the  existence 
of  such  varieties  in  the  same  species  —  varieties  confined 
indeed  within  certain  limits  —  such  limits  as  not  to  confound 


DESCENT  OF  ALL  MANKIND  FROM  NOAH.      373 

or  interfere  with  specific  distinctions.  He  has  manifested 
not  only  wisdom,  but  benevolence  in  so  doing.  Suppose,  e.  g., 
any  one  species  were  of  entire  uniformity  as  to  figure  and 
color,  what  would  be  the  consequence,  not  merely  or  so  much 
to  that  species,  but  to  human  ownership  ?  Property  in  do- 
mestic animals,  as  is  easy  to  perceive,  could  hardly  exist, 
were  this  the  case.  Who  could  tell  which  animal  of  a  given 
species  was  his,  and  which  another  man's,  were  this  so  ?  And 
in  regard  to  mankind,  or  any  one  race  of  them,  if  they  were 
all  identical  in  conformation  and  complexion,  we  can  easily 
imagine  that  some  perplexing  and  troublesome  inconveniences, 
and  amusing  or  melancholy  mistakes,  would  ensue.  The 
domestic  relation  could  hardly  subsist  indeed  under  such 
circumstances.  Husbands  would  be  unable  to  recognize 
their  wives,  and  vice  versa.  Children  would  be  without  the 
best  means,  to  say  the  least,  of  knowing  their  parents  ;  and 
parents  of  determining  who  were  their  children.  The  honest 
man  might  be  confounded  with  and  punished  in  the  room  of 
the  rogue,  and  the  latter  be  taken  for  and  treated  as  an  honest 
man.  The  great  social  wheels  would  have  to  stop,  and  con- 
fusion indescribable  and  interminable  would  be  the  result — 
not  as  at  Babel,  from  variety,  but  from  similarity  or  identity. 

Another  and  what  may  be  deemed  a  higher  end  of  this 
diversity  in  each  existing  species,  or  of  the  law  in  conformity 
with  which  such  variety  arises,  is  the  following:  As  the 
whole  earth  was  not  uniform  as  to  climate,  etc.,  there  was  a 
necessity,  in  order  to  the  securing  of  important  ends,  that  an 
adaptability  should  be  introduced  into  the  physical  constitu- 
tion, by  which  creatures  of  the  same  species  should  be  able 
not  only  to  exist,  but  more  or  less  flourish,  in  different  tem- 
peratures, or'otherwise  diversified  circumstances  and  localities. 

But  the  advocates  of  the  doctrine  of  plurality  urge  that  the 

varieties  in  the  five  classes  of  mankind,  particularly  some  of 

them,  are  "exceeding  broad"  —  too  broad  to  allow  a  rational 

entertainment  of  the  idea  that  all  belong  to  one  species,  or 

17 


374      DESCENT  OF  ALL  MANKIND  FROM  NOAH; 

originated  in  a  common  ancestry.  The  objectors  to  our 
doctrine  on  this  ground  may  be  invited  to  turn  tlieir  eye  to 
the  sub-human  departments  of  organic  and  animated  existence ; 
especially  to  those  kinds  that  have  been  subjected  to  domesti- 
cation. The  question  may  be  pressed  upon  them,  Are  there 
not  wide  varieties  among  creatures  of  one  and  the  same 
species  to  be  found  there?  —  varieties  anatomical,  physio- 
logical, and  in  color,  equally  wide  with  those  discoverable 
among  the  human  races  ?  We  would  ask  them  to  look  at 
the  several  species  of  domesticated  animals :  At  the  horse 
(Equus  caballus.)  "Under  all  its  varieties,"  as  Dr.  Bachman 
observes,  (p.  124,)  "it  is  undoubtedly  of  one  species,  since 
it  is  the  only  true  horse,  either  in  a  wild  or  domesticated 
state."  By  all  naturalists  of  high  authority  it  is  admitted 
and  has  been  maintained  that  it  has  descended  from  the  same 
stock.  Let  them  cast  their  eye  at  the  massive  London  dray 
horse,  or  Pennsylvania  Conestoga,  down  through  the  varieties, 
the  Arabian  horse,  the  French  coach  horse,  Canada  horse,  the 
marsh  tackey  of  Carolina,  to  the  pony  of  the  Shetland 
islands.  Will  the  advocate  of  a  plurality  of  species  in  men 
on  account  of  variety  observable  among  them,  turn  from  this 
survey  of  the  equine  species  and  continue  to  insist  that  the 
races  of  men  cannot  be  of  the  same  species,  or  have  their 
descent  from  a  common  ancestral  stock  ?  Let  them  be  invited 
to  inspect  the  varieties  of  the  cow,  the  sheep,  the  dog,  swine, 
and  domestic  fowl.  Will  they  not  find  as  broad  varieties 
among  these,  severally,  as  among  mankind  ?  Yet  we  might 
reasonably  expect  greater  varieties  to  prevail  amongst  men 
than  amongst  the  members  of  any  sub-human  species,  in  part 
arising  from  or  connected  with  the  truly  cosmical  adapta- 
bilities of  which  the  human  creature  evinces  the  possession. 

But  it  may  be  urged  by  oppugners  of  the  doctrine  of  unity, 
that  if  the  prominent  physical  varieties  among  men  are  not 
specific  and  primary,  but  owing  to  subsequent  accidental 
causes  or  influences,  we  should  be  compelled  to  look  for  no 


OR    THE    UNITY    OF     THE     HUMAN   RACES.  375 

fixedness  or  permanence  of  color,  etc.,  under  opposite  acci- 
dental causes  or  influences.  On  the  supposition,  for  instance, 
that  climate  be  one  of  those  influences,  the  same  man  would 
change  in  color  if  for  any  considerable  period  removed  frorn 
one  climate  to  another;  and  as  long  or  often  as  climatic 
changes  occurred,  and  to  the  degree  in  which  they  occurred, 
so  long  or  often,  and  to  such  degree,  would  complexional  and 
other  alterations  ensue. 

We  will  preface  the  few  words  which  we  shall  offer  in  reply, 
with  remarking  that  complexion  or  color,  though  so  obvious 
as  to  be  commonly  regarded  as  one  of  the  most  important  dis- 
tinctions in  the  races,  is  in  reality  not  so.  The  seat  of  the 
diversified  tints  is  barely  the  rete  mucosum,  a  delicate  stra- 
tum interposed  between  the  epidermis  and  cutis  vera  or  true 
skin.  A  distinction  so  superficial  does  not  appear  to  furnish 
a  solid  foundation  on  which  to  build  a  hypothesis  so  weighty 
as  a  plurality  of  species  ;  or  to  present  a  vastly  formidable 
objection  to  the  doctrine  of  unity  of  descent  of  the  various 
families  of  man.  That  climate,  situation,  food,  mode  of  life, 
etc.,  exert  an  influence  upon  the  susceptible  human  constitu- 
tion, few  if  any  will  deny,  how  much  soever  they  may  differ  as 
to  the  degree  or  duration  of  the  influence.  There  is  an  indis- 
putable tendency  in  the  human  creature,  and  we  may  add,  in 
sub-human,  too,  to  put  on  certain  changes  of  color,  hair, 
form,  etc.,  when  removed  from  one  climate  and  locality 
to  another,  or  when  subjected  to  any  great  change  in  manner 
or  habits  of  life.  "Whether,"  says  a  respectable  writer, 
"the  external  condition  of  these  changes  be  the  chemical 
solar  rays ;  the  altitude  or  depression  of  the  general  level ; 
the  difference  of  geological  formations ;  the  varying  agencies 
of  magnetism  and  electricity ;  atmospheric  peculiarities ;  mias- 
matic exhalations  from  vegetable  or  mineral  matter ;  differ- 
ence of  soils  ;  proximity  to  the  ocean  ;  variety  of  food,  habits 
of  life  and  exposure  —  all  of  which  perhaps  at  times  come  in 
play  —  or  other  causes  yet  more  occult ;  there  can  be  no 


376      DESCENT  OF  ALL  MANKIND  FROM  NOAH; 

question  about  the  fact  that  such  causes  are  at  work.  The 
general  fact  is,  that  when  the  other  physical  conditions  are 
the  same,  tribes  living  nearest  the  equator,  and  level  of  the 
sea,  are  marked  with  the  darkest  skin  and  the  crispest  hair. 
Thus,  we  make  a  gradual  ascent  from  the  jetty  negro  of  the 
line  to  the  olive  colored  Arab,  the  brown  Moor,  the  swarthy 
Italian,  the  dusky  Spaniard,  the  dark-skinned  Frenchman,  the 
ruddy  Englishman,  and  the  pallid  Scandinavian." — (Moore.) 
In  regard  to  the  duration  or  permanence  of  varieties,  this 
appears  to  be  a  general  fact,  that,  when  once  formed,  they 
never  return  to  their  original  type,  if  left  to  themselves. 
They  may  be  changed  into  new  varieties,  by  being  subjected 
to  new  circumstances  ;  but,  if  left  alone,  they  will  perpetuate 
their  own  characteristics,  and  not  those  from  which  they 
have  departed.  The  motto  of  nature  is,  nulla  vestigia  re- 
trorsum.  Hence  the  negro  does  not  become  white  or  ruddy 
by  leaving  a  burning  equatorial  region  and  becoming  an  in- 
habitant of  a  temperate  locality. 

By  the  advocates  of  plurality  of  primeval  parentage,  it  is 
additionally  urged,  that  the  prominent  diversities  found  among 
men  are  ancient  —  so  ancient  as  to  be  incompatible  with  the 
doctrine  that  universal  mankind  proceeded  from  a  single 
original  stock.  With  the  view  of  fully  establishing  this  point, 
the  mummies  of  Egypt  have  been  hunted  up,  and  the  grave- 
yards of  gray  antiquity  ransacked. 

That  prominent  varieties  early  had  an  existence  we  are  not 
disposed  to  deny.  The  flexile  tendencies  to  variation,  the 
adaptive  susceptibilities  imparted  to  man's  physical  constitu- 
tion at  the  beginning,  would,  under  appropriate  circumstances 
or  influences,  to  some  extent  work  out  results  of  this  nature 
even  in  antediluvian  times.  This  law  had  made  its  imprints 
on  the  little  Noachic  band  that  had  come  over  the  waters  from 
the  Old  to  the  New  World.  Under  its  operation  even  Noah's 
three  sons  were  not  precisely  alike.  Much  less  were  their 
wives,  who  came  from  different  families  and  probably  differ- 


OR  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  RACES.      377 

ent  localities  of  the  Old  World.  Their  immediate  offspring 
would  be  more  variant  from  one  another  than  were  they. 
And  as  one  generation  succeeded  another,  the  diversities 
would  by  the  same  cause  increase.  If,  as  some  suppose,  the 
deluge  for  a  time  left  influences  tending  to  facilitate  the  oper- 
ation of  existing  constitutional  adaptabilities,  and  if,  as  has 
been  also  imagined,  these  last  were  in  the  earlier  ages  greater 
than  since,  there  then  would,  very  soon  after  the  Flood, 
appear  very  considerable  varieties  among  our  patriarch's 
descendants. 

But  in  accounting  for  the  antiquity  of  leading  varieties  in 
the  human  kind,  it  is  our  deliberate  opinion  that  at  some  early 
period  subsequent  to  the  Deluge,  there  was  a  preternatural 
intensifying  of  prime  physical  susceptibilities ;  that  this  may 
have  occurred  at  the  era  of  God's  giving  directions  to  Noah 
respecting  the  partition  of  the  earth  among  his  descendants ; 
or,  as  we  are  rather  inclined  to  think,  synchronally  with  the 
miraculous  Confusion  of  Tongues  at  Babel.  We  have  on  a 
former  occasion  expressed  our  belief  of  the  great  final  cause  of 
that  Confusion.  For  the  same  grand  reason  it  seems  to  us 
that  the  Supreme  Ruler  would  superadd  the  effect  just  men- 
tioned. Devising  for  wise  and  benevolent  purposes  the 
speedy  spread  of  mankind  abroad,  and  not  only  their  proxi- 
mate or  temporary  but  persistent  separation,  he  would,  the 
more  effectually  and  completely  to  secure  what  he  wished, 
cause  early  to  exist  among  the  postdiluvians,  considerable 
physical  as  well  as  linguistic  diversities.  This  intensifying 
of  original  constitutional  tendencies  to  variation  he  would 
cause  to  continue  just  so  long  as  would  be  seen  by  him  requi- 
site to  secure  the  desired  broad  and  abiding  physical  differ- 
ences. As  to  intermediate  varieties,  they  are  produced, 
among  other  means,  by  copulative  interminglings  of  the 
wider ;  and  they  are  on  the  constant  increase. 

In  our  last  preceding  lecture  we  referred  to  an  eminent 
naturalist  of  our  day,  as  the  repromulgator  of  the  doctrine  of 


378  DESCENT    OF   ALL    MANKIND    FROM   NOAH; 

a  plurality  of  origin  of  mankind.  He,  contrary  to  all  others, 
if  we  mistake  not,  holding  to  the  plurality  doctrine,  acknow- 
ledges the  genus  "homo"  to  consist  of  a  single  species,  but 
uses  the  term  species  in  such  a  sense  as  not  to  be  incompatible 
with  the  doctrine  of  diversity  of  origin.  Having  first  labored 
to  establish  the  position  that  there  are  certain  "zoological 
provinces,"  the  fauna  as  well  as  flora  of  which  severally  were 
created  in  the  province  itself,  and  not  introduced  into  it  by 
migration  or  transfer  from  a  common  centre,  he  proceeds  to 
maintain  that  "  each  province  has  its  own  race  of  men,  which 
could  not  have  come  from  a  single  pair,  but  must  have  been 
created  each  in  the  province  where  it  is  found."  The  proto- 
plasts or  primary  human  occupants  of  the  different  provinces, 
too,  were  not  created  simultaneously,  but  at  different  seasons. 
The  Adam  and  Eve  of  Genesis,  according  to  him,  were  far 
from  the  only  pair  brought  into  being  when  they  were ;  and 
they  were  by  no  means  of  the  first  race  of  the  human  kind 
that  were  created. 

To  this  we  venture  the  following  very  brief  remarks  in 
reply: — First,  The  fact  that  the  human  creature  is  possessed 
of  cosmical  and  not  merely  provincial  adaptabilities  is  itself 
pretty  strong  proof,  that  the  races  of  mankind  were  not 
created  and  primarily  located  at  different  centres.  Secondly, 
Violence  is  done  to  the  Mosaic  history  by  attempts  to  recon- 
cile it  with  the  hypothesis  that  "Adam  and  Eve  were  not  the 
only  nor  the  first  human  pair  created."  If  Adam  and  Eve 
were  formed  on  the  sixth  geogonic  day,  there  could  have  been 
no  pre-Adamites ;  and  if  biblical  interpreters,  and  no  less 
than  an-inspired  apostle  among  the  number,  (1  Cor.  15:  45, 
47,)  understand  correctly  the  teachings  of  the  archaic  record, 
then  Adam  was-  "the  first  man,"  and,  consequently,  there 
were  no  other  men  created  simultaneously  with  him,  much 
less  before  him.  Thirdly r,  A  creative  act  being  a  miracle,  it  is 
unphilosophical  to  resort  to  so  many  miracles  for  the  produc- 
tion of  a  species,  when  a  far  less  number  may  be  reasonably 


OR    THE    UNITY    OP     THE     HUMAN   RACES.  379 

believed  quite  sufficient  to  answer  the  purpose.  Fourthly, 
The  prevalent  conclusions  of  the  highest  geological  authori- 
ties go  to  confirm  the  Mosaic  account  as  to  the  recent  date 
of  primeval  man.  These  testify  that  there  were  no  pre- 
Adamites.  Fifthly,  All  history,  as  well  as  tradition,  points 
to  one  part  of  the  earth,  and  that  Central  Asia,  as  the  cradle 
of  the  human  race.  Sixthly,  It  is  declared  by  Dr.  Pickering, 
that  it  appears,  "  on  zoological  grounds,  that  the  human  family 
is  foreign  to  the  American  Continent." 

An  important  branch  of  ethnology  remains  yet  unconsulted 
in  regard  to  the  interesting  and  momentous  inquiry  before  us. 
It  might  be  justly  considered  as  a  great  and,  indeed,  culpable 
omission,  did  we  altogether  fail  to  question  her  in  reference 
to  the  extent  of  the  paternity  of  our  patriarch.  We  allude 
to  Comparative  Philology,  or  what  the  French  term  Linguis- 
tique.  We  regret  that  we  have  time  to  listen  to  the  testimony 
of  this  witness  but  for  a  few  moments.  Thankful  we  will 
feel,  however,  for  the  opportunity  to  catch  from  her  lips  even 
a  few  wrords  on  this  point.  It  is  not  yet  three-fourths  of  a 
century — little,  if  any,  more  than  a  half — since  she  assumed 
such  form  and  dimensions  as  to  entitle  her  to  the  appellation 
of  science.  Bursting  forth  then  from  the  dark  and  narrow 
cell  and  heavy  enslaving  shackles  by  which  she  had  long 
been  cramped,  as  well  as  confined,  she  exhibited,  for  a  while, 
the  wild  and  antic  waywardness  of  chafed  and  inexperienced 
childhood.  The  last  century  may,  perhaps,  truly  be  said  to 
have  closed  with  such  a  state  of  linguistique  as  either  to  favor 
the  now  confessedly  insupportable  hypothesis,  that  the  Babelic 
Confusion  consisted  or  resulted  in  the  origination  of  quite  a 
number  of  languages,  bearing,  for  the  most  part,  no  affinities 
to  each  other ;  or  else  to  corroborate  such  a  theory  as  that  of 
Professor  Agassiz,  that  mankind  had  originated  in  different 
"provinces,"  between  the  different  portions  or  various  clusters 
of  whom  there  existed,  at  least  primarily,  no  more  linguistic 
than  sanguineous  relationship.  Those  linguists  who  continued 


380  DESCENT    OF  ALL    MANKIND    FROM   NOAH  ; 

to  recognize  any  family  connection,  did  so  on  the  ground  of 
what  they  regarded  Mosaic  authority,  and  then  seemed  to 
know  no  other  family  than  Shemitic,  which  they  made  emi- 
nently broad  —  so  broad  as  to  embrace  the  whole  range  of 
language. 

The  present  century  opened  with  the  dawn  of  more  intel- 
ligent views  in  regard,  first,  to  what  constitutes  the  truly 
Shemitic,  or,  as  Dr.  Prichard  prefers  terming  it,  Syro-Ardbian 
family  —  which,  by  the  way,  comprises  the  Hebrew,  Aramaic 
(Chaldee  and  Syriac,)  and  the  Arabic,  inclusive  of  the 
Ethiopic  and  extreme  northern  African.  Having  proceeded 
thus  far,  marking  the  relations  and  defining  the  bounds  of  the 
different  portions  of  this  family  —  philology  did  not  nor  could 
stop  there.  She,  synchronously,  began  making  a  new  and 
remarkable  discovery  ;  commenced  tracing  a  connection  of  a 
nature  before  not  dreamed  of.  One  member  after  another 
she  succeeded  in  detecting  of  that  numerically  large  and 
geographically  extensive  family  now  known  under  the  name 
of  Indo-European.  In  the  valuable  Ethnographic  Map  usu- 
ally placed  at  the  front  of  Dr.  Wiseman's  Lectures  on  the 
Connection  between  Science  and  Revealed  Religion,  you  may 
behold  at  a  glance  the  boundaries  (among  others)  of  this 
wide  family,  —  beginning  at  the  southeastern  extremity  of 
hither  India ;  running  through  a  large  part  of  middle  and 
western  peninsular  Asia,  embracing  the  territories  of  the 
Hindoos,  Afghans,  Persians,  Ancient  Medes,  Khurds,  Ossetes 
of  Caucasus,  Armenians,  etc.,  and,  with  the  exception  of  a 
few  narrow  and  curiously  isolated  spots,  the  whole  of  Europe. 
The  names  of  the  principal  modern  languages  prevailing 
within  these  vast  territorial  limits,  are  indicated  in  large 
measure  by  the  names  of  the  countries  in  which  they  are 
found,  together  with  those  ancient  languages,  the  Sanskrit  of 
the  farther  East,  and  the  Greek  and  Latin  of  the  West. 
Through  the  untiring  efforts  of  able  European  philologists, 
there  have  been  proved  most  undoubted  affinities  existing 


OR   THE    UNITY    OF     THE    HUMAN   RACES.    .          381 

between  these  several  languages  —  real  and  manifest  affinities* 
not  alone  verbal  or  radical,  but  also  in  grammatical  structure. 
"  If  we  compare,"  says  Dr.  Prichard,  "  the  grammatical  forms 
and  vocabularies  of  the  Sanskrit,  Greek,  Latin,  Zend,  Ger- 
man, Lithuanian,  Slavic,  and  Celtic  languages,  we  discover  — 
besides  analogies  in  the  laws  of  construction  or  in  the 
mechanism  of  speech,  which  is  of  all  marks  of  affinity  the 
most  important  —  a  palpable  resemblance  in  many  of  those 
words  which  represent  the  ideas  of  a  people  in  the  most  sim- 
ple state  of  existence.  Such  are  terms  expressive  of  family 
relations,  father,  mother,  brother,  sister,  son,  daughter ; 
names  for  the  most  striking  objects  of  the  material  universe  ; 
terms  distinguishing  the  different  parts  of  the  body,  as  head, 
feet,  eyes,  ears  ;  names  of  numbers  up  to  five,  ten,  or  twenty ; 
verbs  descriptive  of  the  most  common  sensations  and  bodily 
acts,  such  as  eating,  drinking,  sleeping,  seeing,  hearing,"  etc. 
(Researches  into  the  Physical  History  of  Mankind,  vol.  3,  p. 
9.)  It  might  be  briefly  added,  that  resemblances  between 
the  numerous  members  of  this  family  are  to  be  traced  in  the 
personal,  demonstrative,  and  interrogative  pronouns  ;  in  ver- 
bal roots  and  words  of  primary  necessity  ;  in  the  case  signs  of 
nouns,  and  in  the  case  system  generally ;  a  prevalent  resem- 
blance in  what  is  usually  called  the  conventional  gender  of 
nouns ;  in  the  formation  of  the  comparative  and  superlative 
degrees  of  adjectives ;  in  the  internal  inflection  of  verbs,  etc. 
Of  all  the  numerous  members  of  the  great  Indo-European 
family,  none  is  more  noteworthy  than  the  Sanskrit — whose 
history  has  so  much  of  the  air  of  romance ;  whose  origin, 
contrary  to  the  strange  and  untenable  conjecture  of  Dugald 
Stewart,  lies  back  in  remote  antiquity ;  and  whose  position, 
in  regard  to  the  other  members,  is  peculiarly  prominent,  if 
not  actually  paternal;  —  a  language  remarkable,  moreover, 
for  its  energy,  regularity,  and  richness  —  the  name  itself, 
according  to  Bopp,  signifying  "  adorned,  completed,  perfect ; " 
as  well  as  associationally,  in  an  eminent  degree,  interesting, 
17* 


382  DESCENT    OF    ALL    MANKIND    FTIOM   NOAIT  ; 

from  the  many  striking  similarities  between  it  and  the  other 
members  of  the  immense  family.  Of  Sanskrit  roots,  there 
are  said  to  be  not  less  than  five  hundred  to  be  found  in  the 
European  languages. 

In  the  light  barely  of  the  facts  thus  summarily  brought  to 
view,  how  can  the  mind  fail  to  infer  the  unity  of  the  vast 
Indo-European  race,  so  called,  and  their  origin  from  one 
locality  and  one  family? 

In  regard  to  the  two  important  families  already  named,  to 
wit,  the  Shemitic  and  Indo-European,  we  would  have  you 
apprised  of  the  fact  that,  instead  of  sustaining  the  attitude  of 
complete  isolation,  as  respects  one  another,  they,  contrary  to 
what  has  been  believed  by  some,  may  be  shown  to  be  linked 
together,  both  "  by  points  of  actual  contact,  and  by  the  inter- 
position of  the  Coptic,  in  a  mysterious  affinity,  grounded  on 
the  essential  structure,  and  most  necessary  forms,  of  the 
three."  Those  who  may  entertain  any  doubt  upon  this  point, 
may  be  referred  to  the  evidence  presented  in  Dr.  Wiseman's 
second  lecture,  (on  the  Connection  &c.,)  drawn  from  Lip- 
sius's  Palaeography. 

Now,  were  we  to  say  naught,  did  we  indeed  know  naught, 
definitely,  about  any  other  portions  of  the  human  race,  we 
might  not  illogically  draw  a  broad  conclusion  from  what  has 
been  already  advanced.  If  so  large  a  part  of  mankind  as 
these  two  families,  —  the  Shemitic  and  Indo-European  — 
comprise,  are  so  linked  together  as  to  indicate  prime  local  and 
parental  identity ;  —  or,  to  go  no  farther,  if  so  truly  vast  a 
portion  of  human  creatures,  even,  as  the  Indo-European  fam- 
ily contain,  possess  such  unity ;  speak,  as  it  were,  one  lan- 
guage— have  proceeded  from  one  locality,  had  one  origin  — 
we  could  hardly  be  accused  of  doing  violence  to  logic,  or  of 
leaping  beyond  all  legitimate  bounds,  by  concluding  that  the 
other  portions  of  the  genus  "homo"  sprang  from  the  same 
locality  and  genital  source.  Yet,  there  are  some  ascertained 
indications,  a  passing  notice  of  which,  notwithstanding  all 


Oil    THE    UNITY    OF     THE     HUMAN    RACES.  383 

our  solicitude  for  brevity,  it  will  not  be  expedient  wholly 
to  withhold. 

As  to  the  languages  of  the  Mongolian  race,  although  they 
apparently  differ  much  from  the  Indo-European,  yet,  from 
some  instances  of  "resemblance  already  discovered,  it  seems 
not  improbable  that,  as  facilities  for  investigation  increase, 
many  important  analogies  may  be  ascertained.  It  is  clear, 
as  the  respected  Professor  Gibbs,  of  Yale,  has  remarked,  that 
"  the  religious  life  of  the  race  has  been  formed  by  Buddhism 
from  India;  and  that  their  religious  language  is  a  mere 
dialect  of  the  Sanskrit."  Who  then  can  think  himself  acting 
reasonably  by  giving  them  a  separate  origin  ?  —  especially, 
as  the  line  of  demarcation,  as  Dr.  Prichard  has  shown,  is 
difficult  to  be  made  —  the  Turks,  for  example,  having  claims 
both  ways. 

In  reference  to  the  Malay  or  Polynesian  race,  we  would 
simply  remark,  that  we  have  good  authority  for  averring  that 
there  is  a  radical  resemblance  between  their  languages  ;  and 
that  a  distinct  origin  for  that  race,  either  on  historical  or 
philological  grounds,  is  not  known  to  have  any  respectable 
advocate. 

In  regard  to  the  African  dialects,  the  means  have  hitherto 
been  but  stintedly  enjoyed  for  determining  their  character. 
An  article  from  the  pen  of  Rev.  J.  L.  Wilson,  published  in 
the  Biblica  Sacra,  (November,  1847,)  shows  that  they  begin 
already  to  arrange  themselves  in  groups ;  and  that,  in  par- 
ticular, "  crossing  the  Mountains  of  the  Moon,  we  find  one 
great  family  of  languages  extending  itself  over  the  whole  of 
the  southern  division  of  the  continent," 

As  to  the  Aboriginal  American  race,  it  has  been  observed 
that  a  general  similarity  of  structure  has  been  found  in  their 
languages ;  that  these  begin  to  arrange  themselves  in  groups  ; 
and  that  no  sufficient  reason  exists  for  holding  to  their  separate 
origin. 

What  then,  young  gentlemen,  is  the  conclusion  to  which  by 


384      DESCENT  OF  ALL  MANKIND  FROM  NOAH. 

this  linguistic  inquiry  we  are  led,  but  the  following?  —  So  far 
as  Comparative  Philology  has  yet  possessed  herself  of  the 
ability  to  bear  intelligent  and  correct  testimony,  she  witnesses 
in  favor  of  one  local  and  ancestral  source  for  the  human  kind ; 
and,  as  to  her  yet  future  advances,  she  promises  to  bear 
gradually  clearer  and  fuller  evidence  in  the  same  direction. 
Facilities  for  intercommunication  are  now  so  multiplying 
and  extending,  that  the  time  is,  perhaps,  not  far  distant  when 
the  sciences  which  specially  have  to  do  with  the  main  ques- 
tion before  us,  will  find  no  obstacle  in  the  way,  or  opportunity 
wanting,  to  the  most  unbounded  investigation,  or  extensive 
research.  Those  who  shall  then  be  living  on  the  earth,  as 
some  of  you  may  be,  will,  we  venture  to  predict,  be  afforded 
the  privilege  of  seeing  such  an  abundance  of  clear  and  strong 
evidence  in  support  of  the  doctrine  for  which  we  are  con- 
tending, as  to  allow  the  existence  of  no  doubt  about  its  truth. 
We  do  not,  indeed,  imagine  that  philological  investigation, 
when  most  extended  as  well  as  thorough,  will  be  able  to  trace 
such  perfect  analogies  or  affinities  between  all  languages,  as 
to  ignore  or  disprove  the  Mosaic  testimony  in  regard  to  the 
linguistic  event  at  Babel ;  but  these  two  things  she  may 
effectually  succeed  in  doing: — She  may  cast  no  little  light 
upon  the  character  of  that  event ;  and  she  may  show  conclu- 
sively that  mankind,  in  all  her  multitudes  and  varieties,  are 
the  descendants  of  those  who  were  gathered  on  the  Shinaric 
plains.  And  this  being  done,  there  will,  from  that  point,  be 
no  difficulty  in  tracing  the  entire  human  kind  up  to  our 
patriarch  as  their  common  father. 


EVENING   THIRTIETH. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

Were  we  reasoning  with  professed  anti-biblists  on  the 
topic  which  has  the  last  two  evenings  engaged  our  notice,  we 
would  not,  of  course,  think  of  resorting  to  the  Bible  for  argu- 
ment—  ask  not  at  all  what  witness  it  bears  on  the  question. 
But  as  at  least  some  of  the  advocates  of  plurality  profess  a 
reverence  for  the  Sacred  Scriptures ;  essay  to  convince 
the  friends  of  Revelation  that  their  theory  conflicts  not 
with  her  testimonies  —  nay,  farther,  derives  a  measure  of 
support  from  that  source  —  it  is  lawful  and  proper  for  us  to 
meet  them  here,  and  to  attempt  to  show  that  their  labor  in 
that  direction  is  uselessly  expended ;  that  their  pluralistic 
hypothesis  is  neither  supported  by  nor  reconcilable  with  the 
teachings  of  the  Word  of  God.  On  this  ground  it  was  that 
early  in  the  argument  there  was,  on  two  or  three  occasions, 
reference  made  by  us  to  it  —  more  particularly  to  its  historic 
testimony  in  relation  to  the  subject.  But  we  feel  the  more 
inimical  to  their  theory  on  account  of  what  we  deem  the  bale- 
ful effect,  in  the  case  of  those  who  embrace  it,  on  doctrinal 
belief.  Indeed  we  see  not  how  such  theory  can  be  clung  to 
without  having  one's  religious  creed  rendered  (if  not  before- 
hand so)  exceedingly  inconsistent  with  the  didactic  utterances 
of  Holy  Writ.  To  our  heart  no  order  of  truths  is  so  dear  as 
those  denominated  evangelical ;  and  their  hold  on  human  belief 


386  DEMAND    ON    ADVOCATES    OP     PLURALITY. 

we  cannot  see  in  any  manner  or  measure  impaired  but  with 
deep  pain. 

Before  those  advocates  of  plurality  who  profess  to  have  a 
reverence  for  the  Bible  can  with  propriety  expect  the  friends 
of  evangelical  religion  to  entertain  favorably  their  theory,  it 
may,  we  think,  be  reasonably  demanded  of  them  that  they 
take  some  pains  to  show  that  the  two  are  not  in  conflict,  — 
that  at  least  as  to  some  of  the  prominent  features  they 
coalesce.  They  may  be  kindly  asked  to  show  how  in  order  to 
the  enjoyment  of  a  happy  immortality,  for  instance,  not  some 
men  merely — not  some  of  the  races  or  varieties  of  human 
creatures  barely  —  not  the  inhabitants  solely  of  one  or  a  few 
of  the  "zoological  provinces"  —  but  absolutely  all  men, 
everywhere,  need  to  hear  and  believe  the  gospel ;  why  a 
great  moral  ^revolution  is  universally  indispensable;  why 
all  men,  everywhere  —  not  simply  some  one  race  or  variety 
of  mankind  —  are  required  to  repent,  deny  themselves, 
receive  and  follow  Chirst  —  why  they  must  so  do  or  else  be 
eternally  wretched.  Those  pluralists  may  be  asked  to  satisfy 
so  small  a  demand  as  that  of  showing  how  all  the  races  or 
varieties  of  mankind,  the  entire  human  occupants  of  all  the 
zoological  provinces,  without  an  exception,  are  sinful  and 
mortal.  Those  who  hold  to  the  unity  of  origin  of  all  human 
beings  —  who  believe  that  entire  mankind  descended  from 
one  human  pair  —  stand  ready  to  satisfy,  and  very  quickly 
too,  every  demand  of  this  sort.  Those  who  ask  them  such 
questions  they  will  refer  to  a  few  verses,  mostly  in  the  fifth 
chapter  of  Paul's  Epistle  to  the  Romans,  as  explanatory  of 
the  whole  matter. 

But,  should  it  be  granted  that  all  the  existing  inhabitants 
of  the  globe  have  proceeded  from  the  same  original  stock  — 
are  the  descendants  of  a  common  father  —  yet  it  may  be 
objected  that  our  postdiluvian  patriarch,  so  called,  cannot 
rightly  be  regarded,  even  in  a  secondary  sense,  as  that  com- 
mon father  —  that  he  is  entitled  to  no  such  distinction  as  that 


ATICTI^EOLOGICAL    OBJECTION.  387 

of  universal  paternity.  The  objection  to  which  we  refer  is 
of  an  archaeological  or  historical  character,  and  runs  thus : 
There  are  nations  presenting  evidence  of  higher  antiquity 
than  the  days  of  Noah  —  such,  for  instance,  as  the  Chaldeans, 
Chinese,  Hindoos,  and  especially  the  Egyptians. 

That  claims  of  this  kind  have  been  set  up,  cannot  be  de- 
nied ;  but  we  are  not  quite  prepared  to  say  that  the  justness 
of  them  is  undeniable.  Apart  from  the  hints  furnished  by 
the  Mosaic  records,  be  it  observed,  there  is  extant  no  reliable 
history  of  the  rise  of  the  nations  of  remotest  antiquity.  A 
few  scattered  fragments  of  so-called  annals,  only,  have  sur- 
vived the  wreck  of  ages,  and  these  are  "  rudis  indigestaque 
molis,"  a  rude  and  indigested  mass,  floating  on  the  gulf  of 
time,  incongruous  in  themselves,  and  unconnected  with  each 
other ;  oppressed  and  smothered  almost  beneath  successive 
accumulations  of  mythologic  fiction,  philosophizing  allegory, 
and  recondite  mysticism. 

As  to  the  Chaldeans  we  hardly  need  say  more  than  this  — 
that  though  Alexander  (called  the  Great)  is  reported  to  have 
discovered  in  Babylon  observations  for  one  thousand  nine 
hundred  and  three  years  previous  to  his  arrival  thither,  the 
very  commencement  of  their  chronology  has  been  proved  to 
go  no  farther  back  than  the  era  of  king  Nabonassar, 
or  seven  hundred  and  forty-seven  years  before  Christ. 
Among  the  fragments  from  Berosus's  history  preserved 
by  Josephus,  Eusebius,  and  others,  is  to  be  found  a  tra- 
dition of  their  original,  which  is  remarkable  for  being  so 
closely  analogous  to  the  details  of  sacred  history,  as  to  leave 
no  doubt  upon  the  mind  concerning  the  source  whence 
it  came.  After  an  elaborate  description  of  Babylonia, 
and  a  strange  story  of  a  certain  creature  which  in  the  first 
year  of  the  world  came  out  of  the  Red  Sea,  conversed  fa- 
miliarly with  men,  and  taught  them  the  knowledge  of  letters 
and  several  useful  arts,  Berosus  proceeds  to  give  a  short 
account  of  the  kings,  the  names  of  whom  were  Alorus,  Alas- 


388  ARCHAEOLOGICAL    OBJECTION   AGAINST 

parus,  Amilon,  Ammenon,  Megalarus,  Daomus,  Eudoreschus, 
Amempsinus,  Oliartes,  and  Xisuthrus.  The  first  of  these 
corresponds  with  the  Adam  of  Genesis ;  as  the  last,  from 
what  is  said  of  him,  manifestly  does  with  Noah.  For  of  this 
Xisuthrus  it  is  related  that  he  was  forewarned  of  a  flood ; 
commanded  to  build  a  ship,  &c.,  according  to  the  tradition 
among  the  Chaldeans  to  which  we  referred  when  treating  on 
the  subject  of  traditions  of  the  deluge.  The  ten  kings  whose 
names  have  just  been  given,  maybe  understood  as  correspond- 
ing with  or  answering  to  the  heads  of  the  ten  generations 
preceding  the  deluge  in  the  line  of  Seth.  Here  then  is  to  be 
seen  something  rather  corroborative  of,  than  hostile  to,  the 
Mosaic  history.  Syncellus  indeed  notices  (p.  30)  a  period  of 
four  hundred  and  thirty-two  thousand  years,  as  including  the 
reigns  of  their  first  kings.  But  this  is  evidently  the  amount 
of  one  thousand  two  hundred  years  multiplied  by  three  hun- 
dred and  sixty  days  —  the  Chaldeans,  in  after  ages,  to 
enhance  their  antiquity,  magnifying  days  into  years.  (See 
Hales's  Analysis  of  Chronology,  vol.  1,  p.  143,  and  vol. 
3,  p.  9.) 

The  Encyclopedia  of  Religious  Knowledge,  under  the  head 
of  Empire  of  Babylon,  after  remarking  of  it,  that  it  may  be 
considered  as  the  first  great  monarchy  of  which  any  records 
are  to  be  found  in  history,  says,  "  It  appears  to  have  been 
founded  a  short  time  after  the  flood ;  and  —  according  to  the 
astronomical  tables  sent  by  Alexander  to  Aristotle  —  about 
two  thousand  two  hundred  and  thirty-four  years  B.  C.  Of 
this  first  Babylonian  kingdom  there  is  very  little  to  be  known 
except  what  is  related  in  the  Sacred  Scriptures ;  'that  about 
two  thousand  years  B.  C.  it  consisted,  under  Nimrod,  of  four 
cities,  Babel,  Erech,  Accad,  and  Calneh,"  etc* 

As  to  the  Chinese  nation,  there  has  been  claimed  by  and 
for  her  great  antiquity.  But  that  their  empire  as  such  ex- 
isted before  the  Flood,  and  before  the  era  which  we  assign  for 
the  Creation  of  the  World,  is  as  extravagant  and  unfounded 
as  the  mythological  stories  of  some  other  nations.  We  have 


UNIVERSAL    DESCENT  FROM    NOAH    CONSIDERED.     389 

in  our  hand  the  first  of  two  volumes  from  the  pen  of  the  Rev. 
Charles  Gutzlaff, —  whose  name  is  familiar  to  you  all,  —  en- 
titled, "  A  Sketch  of  Chinese  History,  Ancient  and  Modern/' 
from  which,  as  reliable  authority,  we  will  give  you  a  few  sen- 
tences. "  Not  only,"  says  this  writer,  "  is  the  fabulous  part  of 
the  Chinese  history  very  uncertain,  but  even  the  first  two  dy- 
nasties, Hea  and  Shang,  labor  under  great  difficulties,  which 
have  never  been  entirely  removed.  We  must  in  fact  date 
the  authentic  history  of  China  from  Confucius,  five  hundred 
and  fifty  years  B.  C.,  and  consider  the  duration  of  the  pre- 
ceding period  as  uncertain.  Chinese  ancient  astronomy  has 
been  celebrated  by  many ;  but  if  we  suppose  their  calcula- 
tions to  have  been  correct,  the  ancient  Chinese,  who  lived 
according  to  their  historians  four  thousand  years  ago,  greatly 
surpassed  their  posterity  of  the  present  day,  who,  after  so 
much  instruction  from  foreigners,  still  betray  a  childish  ignor- 
ance on  many  essential  points  of  this  difficult  science.  Con- 
fucius evidently  labors  to  refer  the  origin  of  his  doctrines 
(which  either  originated  with  himself  or  were  transmitted  to 
him  by  tradition)  to  the  remotest  antiquity,  for  the  purpose 
of  inspiring  his  countrymen  with  veneration  for  them.  In 
order  to  effect  this,  he  had  to  create  for  his  nation  an  authen- 
tic history  out  of  the  materials  furnished  by  tradition.  As 
there  were  no  regular  annals,  or  any  celebrated  histori- 
ographer who  flourished  before  his  era,  he  was  not  able,  not- 
withstanding the  most  laborious  researches,  to  avoid  error. 
The  destruction  of  the  greater  part  of  Chinese  books  by 
Che-hwang-te,  the  first  universal  monarch  of  China,"  (whose 
reign  commenced  two  hundred  and  forty-six  years  B.  C.,) 
"  doubtless  contributed  likewise  to  render  the  chronology 
more  erroneous,"  (page  55).  You  have  heard  what  the  author 
has  said  concerning  the  first  two,  i.  e.  the  Hea  and  Shang 
dynasties.  Yet  those  commenced  only  in  the  two  thousand 
two  hundred  and  seventh  year  B.  C.,  and  extended  down  to  the 
one  thousand  one  hundred  and  twenty-third  year  B.  C.  (See 


390  ARCHAEOLOGICAL    OBJECTION    AGAINST 

pages  5S-GO.)  In  other  words,  the  earliest  dynasty,  even 
according  to  this  very  doubtful  record  of  Confucius,  did  not, 
according  to  the  shortest,  i.  e.  the  Hebrew  chronology,  com- 
mence until  one  hundred  and  forty-one  years  subsequent  to 
the  Deluge,  and  according  to  the  Septuagint  not  until  one 
thousand  and  thirty-nine  years  posterior  to  that  event.  In  the 
extract  from  Mr.  Gutzlaff,  allusion  is  made  to  the  destruc- 
tion of  books  by  the  Emperor  Hoangti  (Che-hwang-te.)  Like 
Nabonassar,  the  king  of  Babylon  in  an  earlier  reign,  this  sove- 
reign was  so  ambitious  of  being  reputed  by  posterity  the  found- 
er of  the  empire,  that  he  ordered  all  the  books,  medals,  coin?!, 
and  monuments  of  antiquity  which  could  be  laid  hold  of  to  be 
destroyed,  that  there  might  remain  no  earlier  record,  date,  or 
authority  relative  to  religion,  science,  and  politics,  than  those 
of  his  reign.  Hence,  says  Dr.  Hales,  (Chronology,  vol.  1,  p. 
296,)  "  their  most  authentic  history,  composed  from  the  relics 
of  their  ancient  books  by  Sse-ma-trien,  about  a  century  be- 
fore Christ,  marked  neither  the  dates  nor  the  duration  of 
reigns  or  dynasties,  until  B.  C.  878."  The  celebrated 
Klaproth,  who  came  from  the  study  of  their  authors  with  no 
prejudices  inducing  to  an  undue  depreciation  of  the  glories  of 
the  so-called  Celestials,  instead  of  allowing  them  the  ex- 
tremely venerable  antiquity  claimed  for  them  by  some  of 
their  historians,  does  not  hesitate  to  deny  the  existence  of 
historic  certainty  in  their  empire,  earlier  than  seven  hundred 
and  eighty-two  years  before  Christ.  Should  we  allow  that 
land  then  to  have  been  penetrated  and  incipiently  colonized 
quite  early  after  the  Flood  according  to  the  common  chronol- 
ogy, it  strikes  us  that  we  cannot  be  reasonably  charged  with 
doing  injustice  to  any  high  claim  presented. 

As  to  the  Hindoo  nation,  great  efforts  have  been  made  to 
establish  her  claims  to  such  an  excessive  antiquity  as  to  con- 
flict with  the  Mosaic  history  in  regard  to  the  peopling  of  the 
postdiluvian  world.  One  of  the  ways  in  which  this  has  been 
essayed  to  be  done,  has  been  by  a  reference  to  her  astronomy. 


UNIVERSAL    DESCENT   FROM   NOAH    CONSIDERED.      391 

The  "  unfortunate  Bailly,"  as  Dr.  Wiseman  calls  him,  has 
very  specially  labored  to  show  it  from  this  source.  But  Mr. 
Bentley,  in  particular,  has  effectually  proved  his  attempt  to 
be  eminently  a  failure.  The  Varishta  Siddhanta  and  the 
Sarya  Siddhanta,  which  the  Hindoos  used  to  date  at  some 
millions  of  years  back,  have,  by  the  computations  of  this  lat- 
ter author,  been  brought  down  to  the  tenth  or  eleventh  cen- 
tury of  the  Christian  era.  Even  La  Place,  a  friend  of  Bailly, 
speaking  of  the  Indian  (Hindoo)  astronomical  tables,  say?, 
they  "  suppose  a  very  advanced  state  of  astronomy ;  but  there 
is  every  reason  to  believe  that  they  can  claim  no  very  high 
antiquity."  To  these  testimonies  may  be  added  that  of  Dr. 
Maskelyne,  of  Heeren,  Cuvier,  and  Klaproth,  who  thus 
writes  :  "  Les  tables  astronomiques  des  Hindous,  auxquelles 
on  avait  attribue  une  antiquite  prodigieuse,  ontete  construites 
dans  le  septieme  siecle  de  1'ere  vulgaire,  et  ont  etc  posteri- 
eurement  reportees  par  des  calculs  a  une  epoque  anterieure." 
(Memoires  relatifs  a  1'Asie.) 

If  we  pass  from  the  astronomy  to  the  history  of  the  Hin- 
doo nation,  we  shall  not,  upon  thorough  research,  find  any 
such  evidence  of  high  antiquity  as  to  excite  alarm  lest  our 
postdiluvian  progenitor  should  lose  his  paternity  as  to  that 
people.  There  will,  in  our  investigations,  be  discovered  more 
proofs  of  the  ambition  of  that  nation  to  be  thought  very  ancient, 
than  of  their  actually  being  so.  But  of  direct  personal  in- 
vestigation we  are  spared  the  trouble  —  since  such  men  as 
Sir  Wm.  Jones,  Wilfort,  Heeren,  and  Col.  Tod,  have  gone 
over  this  ground,  and  given  us  the  results  of  their  examina- 
tion. The  conclusion  to  which  these  men  have  come  is,  that 
when  divested  of  fable,  the  history  of  this  people  may  be 
dated  back  some  two  thousand  years  before  the  Christian 
era.  The  last  named  gentleman  (Col.  Tod,)  assuming,  al- 
most without  limitation,  the  chronological  tables  of  the  coun- 
try, does  indeed  extend  a  little  the  period.  He  has  ventured 
to  place  the  establishment  in  India  proper  of  the  two  grand 


392  ARCHAEOLOGICAL    OBJECTION   AGAINST 

races  distinctively  called  those  of  Soorya  and  Chandra  at  about 
two  thousand  two  hundred  and  fifty-six  years  before  Christ. 
If  you  would  like  to  see  a  somewhat  detailed  account  of  the 
investigations  to  which  we  have  been  alluding,  look  into 
Wiseman's  Lectures,  on  the  Connection  between  Science  and 
Revealed  Religion,  vol.  2,  Lecture  7.  An  additional  thing, 
on  the  authority  of  Col.  Tod,  you  will  find  there  stated,  going 
to  confirm  the  credibility  of  the  Mosaic  history  in  regard  to 
the  earth's  colonization  —  which  is,  that  the  Hindoos  them- 
selves establish  the  birthplace  of  their  nation  towards  the 
west ;  and,  still  farther,  that  there  are  such  curious  coincidences 
between  the  origin  assigned  to  their  respective  nations  by  the 
Monguls,  Chinese,  and  Hindoos,  whilst  distinguished  by  dif- 
ferent languages,  as  to  establish  the  fact  of  a  common  origin. 
•As  to  Egypt,  though  human  feet  early  pressed  her  soil,  yet 
we  believe  her  to  present  no  human  footprints  bearing  testi- 
mony to  an  earlier  colonization  than  the  Mosaic  annals  will 
allow.  From  her  monuments  and  her  history,  both,  efforts 
have  been  indeed  made  to  extort  testimony  adverse  to  certain 
historic  statements  of  Moses,  (as  to  time  rather  than  as  to  fact, 
however,)  and  it  is  surely  well  to  examine  the  true  character 
of  that  testimony.  As  friends  of  revelation  we  have  no  fears 
as  to  the  result.  We  indeed  much  mistake,  if  where  infidelity 
has  wishfully  and  zealously  sought  to  find  evidence  hostile  to, 
there  may  not  be  found  proof  confirmatory  of  the  verity  of 
the  records  of  the  sacred  historian  ;  especially  if  we  do  not 
discard  or  repudiate  the  Septuagint  chronology.  Worthy 
interpreters  have  been  found  of  Egypt's  dark  sayings.  Her 
monuments  have  been  interrogated  —  interrogated  by  men 
to  whom  they  were  not  unwilling  to  listen.  To  the  lips  of 
her  hieroglyphics,  even,  Young,  the  Champollions,  Wilkinson, 
Rosellini,  etc.,  have  put  their  ear,  and  come  away  with  re- 
plies not  of  a  character  to  cheer  the  heart  of  skepticism.  You 
will  fully  understand  our  allusion  by  the  persual  of  the 
Eighth  Lecture  of  the  work  of  Dr.  Wiseman,  but  a  moment 


UNIVERSAL    DESCENT   FROM   NOAH    CONSIDERED.      393 

or  two  since  referred  to  ;*lhd  the  first  three  chapters  of  the 
work  of  Dr.  Hawks,  entitled,  The  Monuments  of  Egypt ;  or, 
Egypt  a  Witness  for  the  Bible.  Among  other  things  let  me 
request  you  to  note  the  result  of  inquiries  and  discussions 
respecting  the  Zodiacs  of  Dendera  and  Esneh.  How  absurd 
has  been  shown  the  antiquity  which  had,  even  by  Burkhardt, 
Dupuis,  etc.,  been  ascribed  or  allowed  to  them. 

And  if  we  turn  from  her  monuments  and  prosecute  our  re- 
searches in  ancient  history,  in  order  to  ascertain  their  rise, — 
the  period  of  the  prime  settlement  of  the  land  of  the  Phara- 
ohs, —  we  shall  find  ourselves  enveloped  in  mist  impenetrable. 
Than  in  relation  to  it  there  is  no  portion  of  the  remoter  annals 
of  the  human  race  more  obscure  from  the  want  of  authentic 
records,  or  more  perplexed  by  groundless  conjecture  and 
bold  speculation.  The  ancient  annalists  whom  the  anxious 
inquirer  interrogates,  require  of  him  to  carry  back  his  imagi- 
nation to  an  era  many  thousand  years  prior  to  the  existence 
of  all  written  deeds ;  and  then  gravely  introduce  him  to  gods 
and  demigods  who  had  once  condescended  to  dwell  on  the 
banks  of  the  Nile,  and  to  govern  the  fancied  inhabitants  of 
that  fertile  region.  In  regard  to  that  land  it  may  indeed  be 
affirmed,  that  the  limits  between  mythology  and  the  simple 
annals  of  a  mortal  race  are  not  yet  fully  established. 

Yet,  to  a  certain  extent,  at  least,  the  history  of  ancient 
Egypt  can  be  placed  on  credible  grounds.  The  reign  of 
Menes  is  to  be  considered  as  marking  the  limits  of  legitimate 
inquiry  in  this  field.  By  different  investigators  different 
dates  have  been  fixed  on  for  the  commencement  of  his  reign. 
According  to  Dr.  Hales,  (Analysis  of  Ancient  Chronology, 
vol.  4,  p.  418,)  it  commenced  B.  C.  2412  years ;  according 
to  Dr.  Prichard,  2214  B.  C.  The  principal  authority  on 
which  this  reign  has  been  determined,  is  Josephus,  who  had 
better  means  of  becoming  acquainted  with  the  works  of 
Manetho,  than  were  enjoyed  by  Eusebius,  Syncellus,  or 
others.  This  writer  (see  his  Antiq.,  Lib.  8,  ch.  G)  assures 


394  ARCHAEOLOGICAL    OBJECTION    AGAINST 

us,  that  Menes  lived  many  years  Before  Abraham,  and  that 
he  ruled  more  than  one  thousand  three  hundred  years  before 
Solomon.  Here  are  such  data  furnished  as  helped  Drs. 
Hales  and  Prichard  to  arrive  at  their  conclusions.  If  you 
bear  in  mind  that  Dr.  Hales's  Chronology  is  the  extended  one 
which  substantially  corresponds  with  the  Septuagint  Chro- 
nology, there  will  be  found,  in  the  date  at  which  he  fixes  the 
commencement  of  the  reign  of  Menes,  nothing  to  conflict  with 
the  Mosaic  history  relative  to  the  period  of  the  Flood,  the 
Dispersion,  etc.  Dr.  Hales  makes  the  first  Egyptian  Dynasty, 

—  beginning  with  Menes,  2412  B.  C.,  —  to  last  two  hundred 
and  fifty-three  years,  i.  e.,  to  2159  B.  C. ;  the  second  Dynas- 
ty, under  the  Hyk-shos,  or  shepherd  kings  —  a  foreign  race 

—  from  the  last  named  period,  two  hundred  and  sixty  years, 
i.  e.,  to  1899  B.  C.     But  be  it  remembered  that  the  same 
Dr.  Hales  fixes  the  epoch  of  the  Deluge  at  3155  B.  C.— - 
presenting   an   interval  of  seven   hundred   and  forty-three 
years  between  the  Flood  and  the  rise  of  the  first  Egyptian 
Dynasty. 

Menes,  called  by  Syncellus  Mestraim,  is  regarded  by 
Shuckford  as  the  Mizraim  of  Moses.  But  shall  we  say 
naught  of  those  dynasties  which  preceded  Menes ;  thirty 
dynasties,  consisting  of  one  hundred  and  thirteen  genera- 
tions, and  which  took  up  the  space  of  thirty-six  thousand 
five  hundred  and  twenty-five  years ;  or  of  the  after-reign  of 
eight  demigods,  during  the  space  of  two  hundred  and  seven- 
teen additional  years ;  or  of  the  Cycli  Cynici,  i.  e.,  according 
to  Manetho,  a  race  of  heroes,  in  number  fifteen,  whose  reigns 
occupied  the  space  of  four  hundred  and  forty-three  still  addi- 
tional years  ?  What  shall  we  say,  unless  this,  that  they  who 
believe  it  en  masse  to  be  anything  above  fiction  or  fable,  have 
a  larger  development  of  the  organ  of  credulity  than  we  have 
any  pretensions  to  ?  That  Egypt  had  been  peopled  before 
the  Flood,  we  have  no  doubt ;  and  if  we  imagine,  with  Afri- 
canus,  that  all  of  what  professed  to  be  historic,  in  regard  to 


UNIVERSAL   DESCENT    FROM    NOAH    CONSIDERED.     395 

times  preceding  Menes,  may  have  been  built  upon  some 
traditional  fragments  or  broken  reports  relative  to  Egypt  in 
the  antediluvian  age,  it  is  to  be  presumed  that  few  will  put 
themselves  to  the  trouble  of  quarrelling  or  finding  fault  with 
us  for  it.  "We  shall  not  tell  all  that  we  might  conjecture  upon 
this  point  —  choosing  to  keep  more  silent  in  reference  to  it 
than  Mr.  Shuckford  has  done. 

From  Menes  or  Misr  downward,  if,  instead  of  imagining 
with  Manetho,  the  whole  number  of  kings  to  have  succeeded 
one  another  in  a  direct  line,  we  agree  with  Sir  John  Marsham 
in  making  a  certain  number  of  them  contemporaries  of  each 
other,  we  shall  find  all  clear.  Moses  may  then  be  regarded 
as  no  great  errorist  even  in  chronology.  As  soon  as  you 
shall  have  opportunity,  it  is  hoped  you  will  consult  the  work 
of  Mr.  R.  S.  Poole,  entitled  Horce  Egyptiacce.  This  Mr. 
Poole  was  brought  up  on  the  banks  of  the  Nile ;  is  a  gentle- 
man of  talents  and  learning,  of  skilful  and  laborious  research ; 
and  has  spent  many  years  in  the  study  of  the  monuments.  This 
author  has  adduced  proofs,  from  the  monuments  themselves, 
that  several  of  the  dynasties  were  really  contemporaneous  — 
just  as  Sir  John  Marsham,  and  not  only  he,  indeed,  but  most 
of  the  learned  for  ages  have  supposed  would  prove  to  be  the 
case.  Mr.  Poole  discovered  on  the  monuments  a  variety  of 
astronomical  signs  and  records,  the  interpretation  of  which, 
it  appears,  he  has  ascertained ;  and  his  calculations  based  on 
those  astronomical  records  confirm  the  conclusions  he  deduces 
from  other  sources,  —  all  going  to  show  that  the  whole  of 
Egyptian  Chronology,  when  properly  understood  and  reduced 
to  order,  is  entirely  consistent  with  the  chronology  of  the 
Bible.  As  to  the  train  of  evidence  adduced  by  Mr.  Poole, 
so  complete  and  convincing  does  it  appear,  that  Sir  J.  G. 
Wilkinson,  one  of  the  most  learned  of  living  men  in  all  that 
relates  to  Egyptian  archaeology,  has  published  his  entire 
concurrence  in  the  views  of  this  writer  on  Egyptian  chro- 
nology, and  his  convictions  of  the  satisfactory  character  of  the 


396  ARCHAEOLOGICAL    OBJECTION   AGAINST 

evidence  which  that  gentleman  has  drawn  from  the  monu- 
ments. At  the  same  time,  we  will  not  be  surprised  if  the 
accuracy  of  these  results  shall  be  called  in  question  by  those 
who  are  strongly  committed  in  the  support  of  the  high 
antiquity  advocated  by  Lipsius  and  Bunsen. 

We  feel  unwilling  to  dismiss  the  archaeological  question 
without  first  dropping  two  general  considerations  ;  only  one 
of  which  however  will  we  tax  you  with  the  statement  of,  this 
evening  —  reserving  the  other  with  which  to  commence  the 
next  and  closing  Exercise. 

The  first,  then,  is  this :  As  we  do  not  find  Moses  con- 
cerned about  giving  us  even  a  connected  history,  much  less  a 
formal  chronology  of  the  times  intervening  between  the  crea- 
tion and  the  birth  of  Abraham ;  and  as  the  dates  presented 
in  his  genealogical  lists  could  so  easily  undergo  alterations, 
either  through  the  carelessness  or  haste  of  transcribers,  or 
(from  some  motive)  through  design,  we  need  not  consider 
the  matters  of  fact  or  of  doctrine  of  the  book  of  Genesis  over- 
thrown, even  if  the  commonly  received  Hebrew  chronology 
of  that  book,  or  that  of  the  Greek  translation,  the  Septuagint, 
could  be  proved  erroneous.  Not  only  might  the  doctrines 
which  Moses  there  teaches  still  be  true ;  but  the  facts  which 
he  states  may  have  occurred  —  this,  though  the  precise  time 
of  their  occurrence  should  not  be  found  accurately  stated. 
We  like  that  remark  of  Dr.  Hawks  in  his  "  Monuments  of 
Egypt,"  p.  30,  "  It  does  not  affect  the  respect  due  to  the 
book  as  an  inspired  volume  of  fact  or  doctrine,  to  consider  its 
general  chronology  an  open  question.  That  it  has  been  so 
considered  and  treated  by  some  of  the  most  pious  and  learned 
men  is  a  fact  well  known  to  the  Biblical  student.  When 
time  is  not  of  the  essence  of  a  fact  recorded,  it  is  unimportant. 
There  are  few  even  of  modern  histories  that  harmonize  in 
dates  ;  yet  no  one  doubts  the  facts  they  state.  In  this  case, 
as  in  the  kindred  one  of  geological  science,  it  would  seem  that 
the  simple  purpose  for  which  the  book  was  written  has  been 


UNIVERSAL    DESCENT    FROM    NOAH    CONSIDERED.      397 

overlooked.     The  Bible  was  never  intended  to  be  a  system 
of  chronology  nor  a  treatise  on  geology." 

Whilst  we  unhesitatingly  subscribe  to  the  sentiments  ad- 
vanced in  this  quotation,  let  it  not  be  understood  —  after  what 
we  have  said  we  cannot  be  understood  —  as  making  any  con- 
cessions to  anti-biblists  in  regard  to  the  main  matter  under 
consideration.  It  is  a  vain  pretence  that  such  and  such 
nations  had  their  rise  many  thousands  of  years  ago.  Even 
the  little  that  we  last  evening  said,  or  rather  alluded  to,  is 
enough  to  show  this.  That  there  will  yet  appear  a  full  and 
most  unquestionable  refutation  or  exposure  of  the  pretensions 
of  certain  nations  to  an  antiquity  irreconcilable  with  the 
chronology  of  Genesis,  we  most  confidently  anticipate,  nor  do 
we  believe  the  day  far  distant.  After  what  we  have  hinted, 
will  you  not  indeed  believe  that  it  has  already  dawned  ?  In 
the  "  land  of  Ham "  in  particular,  much  has  already  been 
and  more  is  no  doubt  on  the  eve  of  being  discovered,  not  only 
coincident  with  but  corroborative  or  illustrative  of  various 
items  of  Biblical  history.  Those  who  are  greedy  of  cumula- 
tive or  confirmatory  testimony  in  regard  to  the  statements  of 
the  writer  of  the  Pentateuch,  are  not  likely  to  be  left  without 
much  more  of  an  archaeological  character  than  they  in  any 
wise  can  reasonably  demand.  As  it  was  with  the  Jews 
regarding  Jesus'  Messiahship,  so  is  it  in  our  day  relative  to 
the  Mosaic  history.  There  is  a  calling  out  for  more  evi- 
dence. Never  satisfied  with  the  mass  which  they  are  already 
afforded,  like  the  daughters  of  the  horseleech  theirc  ontinual 
cry  is  Give,  give.  It  is  probable  that  with  one  tenth  part  of 
the  evidence  they  would  be  content,  in  relation  to  any  points 
not  belonging  to  or  connected  with  Sacred  History.  Only 
in  regard  to  BiUical  matters  is  it  that  they  exhibit  so  pro- 
digious a  maw. 
18 


EVENING    THIRTY-FIRST. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN: 

The  archaeological  consideration,  second  in  order,  with  which 
we  proposed  to  introduce  this  Exercise,  is  the  following : 
Those  several  nations  who  pretend  to  so  vastly  remote  anti- 
quity of  origin  as  to  make  not  barely  the  Noah  but  even  the 
Adam  of  Genesis  a  comparatively  very  modern  gentleman, 
need  not  travel  far,  no,  not  a  step,  either  forward,  backward, 
or  laterally,  to  find  a  flat  denial  of  their  ridiculous  preten- 
sions. They  may  find  it  beneath  their  feet.  The  detritus 
and  rocky  strata  of  the  parts  of  the  globe  where  they  dwell, 
furnish  a  substantial  refutation  of  all  pretensions  of  the  kind. 
These  say,  No  remains  of  such  pretended  far  back  ancestry 
lie  in  our  bosom.  And  if  the  pretenders  are  not  satisfied 
with  such  a  declaration  from  the  lips  of  the  witness,  let  them 
penetrate  her  bowels  and  see  whether  they  can  get  any  more 
favorable  response  there. 

In  Cuvier's  Theory  of  the  Earth,  the  date  of  origin  of  the 
human  species  is  discussed  both  on  geological  and  historical 
grounds,  embracing  a  large  mass  of  learning ;  and  the  date 
usually  assigned  to  the  origin  of  mankind  adopted.  The 
same  views  have  been  expressed  by  Sir  Charles  Lyell ;  views 
which  he  espouses,  not  merely  as  the  result  of  his  own  re- 
searches and  reasonings,  but  of  the  prevalent  conclusions  of 
the  highest  geological  authorities.  "  I  need  not  dwell,"  ob- 


THE   ARCHAEOLOGICAL    OBJECTION    CONSIDERED.     399 

serves  Mr.  Lyell,  "  on  the  proofs  of  the  low  antiquity  of  our 
species,  for  it  is  not  controverted  by  any  experienced  geologist ; 
indeed,  the  real  difficulty  consists  in  tracing  back  the  signs  of 
man's  existence  on  the  earth  to  that  comparatively  modern 
period  when  species,  now  his  contemporaries,  began  to  pre- 
dominate. If  there  be  a  difference  of  opinion  respecting  the 
occurrence,  in  certain  deposits,  of  the  remains  of  man  and 
his  works,  it  is  always  in  reference  to  strata  confessedly  of 
the  most  modern  order ;  and  it  is  never  pretended  that  our 
race  coexisted  with  assemblages  of  animals  and  plants  of 
which  all  or  even  a  great  part  of  the  species  are  extinct." 
You  may  see  an  analogous  argument  of  Berkley  for  the  re- 
cent origin  of  man,  quoted  with  approbation  by  Mr.  Lyell  in 
his  Principles  of  Geology,  vol.  3,  p.  203. 

The  character  of  the  testimony  borne  by  geological  facts 
in  relation  to  man  and  his  works  before  the  Flood,  is  such 
as  strongly  to  favor  the  idea  that  all  the  present  nations  and 
races  of  men  are  descended  from  our  patriarch.  In  regard 
to  the  nature  of  the  facts,  we,  to  avoid  repetition,  refer  you 
to  those  having  a  bearing  on  the  subject,  presented  on  the 
Eleventh  and  Twelfth  Evenings. 

But  so  pertinacious  and  perverse  is  skepticism,  as  further- 
more to  attempt  to  urge  an  objection  to  the  universal  pater- 
nity of  our  patriarch,  drawn  from  the  Mosaic  history  itself. 
It  is  of  this  nature  :  According  to  what  Moses  has  narrated, 
Abraham,  when  he  first  entered  Canaan,  and,  soon  afterward, 
Egypt,  found  there  already  great  and  populous  nations  ;  and 
it  is  not  unreasonable  to  infer  that  equally  populous  and 
flourishing  nations  existed  at  the  time  in  various  other  parts 
of  the  world.  Yet  how  could  this  be  if  these  all  descended 
from  Noah  ?  Could  the  posterity  of  this  one  man  have  pos- 
sibly so  increased  and  extended  itself,  so  soon  after  the  flood  ? 
as  to  answer  to  this  state  of  things  ? 

This  brings  up  the  question  of  Scripture  Chronology  — 
concerning  which  we  can  say  but  little  and  yet  carry  out  our 


400  SCRIPTURE    CHRONOLOGY. 

purpose  of  closing  our  course  of  lectures  this  evening. 
Others  besides  skeptics,  even  many  learned  interpreters  of 
the  Sacred  Word,  have  been  moved,  partly  by  this  just  stated 
consideration,  to  prefer  a  more  extended  to  the  common 
chronology. 

The  chronology  adopted  by  the  English  translators  of 
the  Sacred  Scriptures,  and  placed  in  the  margin  of  our 
Bibles,  is  that  of  the  Masoretic  or  common  Hebrew 
text.  According  to  it,  the  period  which  elapsed  between 
the  Deluge  and  the  call  of  Abraham  was  four  hundred 
and  twenty-seven  years;  and  between  the  Deluge  and 
the  birth  of  Christ  two  thousand  [three  hundred  and  forty- 
eight  years.  The  extended  scheme  to  which  we  alluded,  is 
the  Septuagint  chronology  —  that  is,  the  chronology  of  an 
ancient  Greek  translation  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures.  Accord- 
ing to  this  latter,  the  interval  between  the  Deluge  and  the 
call  of  Abraham  was  one  thousand  two  hundred  and  five 
years ;  and  between  the  Flood  and  the  birth  of  our  Lord 
three  thousand  one  hundred  and  fifty-four  years.  You  see 
how  long  and  confessedly  adequate  a  period  the  Septuagint 
chronology  presents  for  the  increase,  extensive  spread,  and 
national  organization  of  Noah's  posterity  before  Abraham 
left  Mesopotamia  for  Canaan.  If  this  latter  chronological 
system  can  be  shown  to  be  correct,  the  skeptical  objection  is 
at  once  divested  of  all  semblance  of  validity.  Hence,  at  least 
in  part,  many  sincere  friends  of  Holy  Writ  have  been  very 
solicitous  for  its  maintenance,  and  not  a  few  able  Biblical 
scholars  have  volunteered  their  services  in  its  advocacy. 
Of  the  arguments  advanced  by  these  in  its  favor,  many  are 
not  a  little  plausible  ;  some  very  forcible.  Among  others  it 
is,  for  example,  urged,  that  the  shortened  scheme  adopted  by 
Archbishop  Usher  from  the  Masorite  Jews,  is  recent  in  its 
origin,  when  compared  with  the  more  comprehensive  chro- 
nology of  the  Septuagint ;  that  this  last  was  used  before  the 
advent  of  our  Lord ;  was  followed  by  the  fathers  of  the  church ; 


SCRIPTURE     CHRONOLOGY. 


401 


and  appears  not  to  have  been  called  in  question  till,  in  the 
eighth  century,  a  disposition  to  exchange  it  for  the  Rabbini- 
cal method  of  reckoning  was  first  manifested  by  the  venerable 
Bede.*  It  may  be  farther  urged  that  the  contracted  scheme 

*  The  two  following  Tables  give  the  Patriarchal  Genealogies  from  Adam 
to  Abraham,  according  to  the  Septuagint  Chronology. 

TABLE  I.    From  Adam  to  the  Deluge. 


IS 

|s 

Is 

„- 

Is 

s£ 

fi*l 

>H   0> 

.S  2 

£  **"" 

Jl^.S 

^r£f 

'S  ^» 

is 

"S'S 

l5 

s 

•2? 

M  £> 

W  n 

§ 

s 

1 

230 

700 

930 

930 

Seth,  

230 

205 

707 

912 

1142 

435 

190 

715 

905 

1340 

625 

170 

740 

910 

1535 

795 

165 

730 

895 

1690 

960 

162 

800 

962 

1922 

Enoch,  

1122 

165 

200 

365 

1487 

1287 

187 

782 

969 

2256 

1474 

188 

565 

753 

2227 

Noah,  

1662 

600 

950 

2612 

Deluge,  

2262 

TABLE  II.    From  the  Deluge  to  Birth  of  Abraham. 


Shem,  

2 

600 

2264 

135 

303 

438 

2702 

Cainan  2d,  

2399 

130 

330 

460 

2859 

Salah,  

2529 

130 

303 

433 

2962 

2659 

134 

270 

404 

3063 

Peles  . 

2793 

130 

109 

239 

3032 

2923 

132 

239 

3162 

3055 

130 

100 

230 

3285 

3185 

79 

69 

148 

3333 

Terah,  

3264 

f  70 

205 

3469 

(  3334 

I  130 

$3394 

According  to  this  chronology,  the  interval  between  the  Deluge  and  the 
birth  of  Haran,  Terah's  eldest  son,  is  seen  to  be  one  thousand  and 
seventy-two  years;  and  between  the  Deluge  and  the  birth  of  Terah's 
younger  son,  Abraham,  one  thousand  one  hundred  and  thirty-two  years. 

N.  B.— Let  the  reader  compare  the;  above  tables  with  the  two  tables 
in  the  Hebrew  or  common  chronology,  to  be  found,  one  on  page  21,  and 
the  other  on  page  339  of  this  volume. 


402  SCRIPTURE    CHRONOLOGY. 

of  the  Hebrew  or  Masoretic  text  is  rejected  by  many  of  the 
greatest  names  in  this  branch  of  Biblical  literature,  as  being, 
according  to  their  view,  inconsistent  both  with  the  records  of 
other  nations,  and  with  the  history  of  the  ancient  Hebrews 
themselves.  A  detailed  statement  of  grounds  for  admitting 
the  authority  of  the  Septuagint  in  preference  to  that  of  the 
Usherian  or  common  Hebrew,  may  be  found  in  a  preliminary 
dissertation  prefixed  to  the  first  volume  of  Dr.  M.  Russell's 
Connection  of  Sacred  and  Profane  History,  —  which  we  hope 
you  will  soon  read.  This  author  contends  that  the  chro- 
nology of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  and  that  of  the  Greek 
version  were  originally  the  same ;  and  that  the  accuracy  of 
the  latter  was  not  called  in  question  by  the  Jews  for  nearly 
four  hundred  years  —  that  is,  until  the  rapid  progress  of 
Christianity  awakened  the  enmity  of  certain  unprincipled  in- 
dividuals of  that  nation,  who  were  induced  to  alter  the  dates 
of  their  ancient  chronicles,  in  order  to  weaken  the  arguments 
derived  from  them  in  support  of  the  new  religion.  With 
the  Septuagint  letj  it  be  noted  that  not  only  Josephus,  but 
also  Hales  and  Jackson,  substantially  agree  in  reckoning. 
It  has  been  thought  that  for  a  while  past  that  system  has 
been  considerably  multiplying  suffrages  in  its  favor. 

In  support  of  the  commonly  received  chronology,  on  the 
other  hand,  the  following  considerations  may  be  urged:  — 
The  fact  of  the  Usherian  or  shorter  reckoning  being  embodied 
in  the  Hebrew  text  is  itself  not  a  feeble  argument  against  the 
longer  computation ;  and  there  appears  also  to  be  internal 
probability  against  it.  It  is  assumed  that  the  framers  of  the 
present  Hebrew  text  set  out  with  the  deliberate  intention  of 
curtailing  the  true  chronology.  Yet  such  a  charge  is  more 
easily  made  than  substantiated.  A  procedure  of  this  nature 
would  operate  against  the  ordinarily  entertained  Jewish 
opinion  relative  to  the  time  of  the  Messiah's  advent.  It  is 
quite  certain  that  they  have  not  tampered  with  the  sacred 
text  in  those  places  where  the  temptation  to  it  was  greatest ; 


SCRIPTURE     CHRONOLOGY.  403 

and  they  ought  not,  therefore,  to  be  accused  of  this  sacrilege 
in  instances  of  inferior  moment,  except  upon  very  strong  and 
clear  proof.  May  it  not  be  urged  against  such,  a  charge,  that 
the  Jews  of  the  Rabbinical  schools,  those  of  Palestine,  were 
guarded  against  all  temptation  of  tampering  with  the  sacred 
text,  by  the  strict  and  even  superstitious  reverence  with 
which  they  regarded  the  letter  of  the  divine  word  ?  But  the 
Alexandrine  Jews,  living  under  the  influence  of  Grecian 
literature,  and  in  a  syncretizing  age,  began  very  early  to 
relax  this  rigorous  restraint  of  the  written  letter.  Of  this 
tendency  —  so  alien  from  the  character  of  the  Rabbinical  or 
Palestinian  Judaism  —  the  Septuagint  version  exhibits  mani- 
fest traces.  They  had  also  a  special  motive  for  lengthening  the 
Hebrew  textual  chronology.  The  Egyptians,  among  whom 
they  had  their  residence,  would  be  disposed  to  sneer  at  a 
nation  whose  origin  was  so  recent  as  their  sacred  records 
made  the  Hebrew.  Hence  they  would  have  an  intelligent 
inducement  tending  to  the  lengthening  of  the  genealogies. 
Clinton,  in  his  Fasti  Hellenici,  p.  297,  says,  "The  Chaldasans 
and  Egyptians,  (whose  histories  were  about  that  time"— i.  e., 
about  the  time  the  Septuagint  translation  was  made  —  "  pub- 
lished by  Berosus  and  Manetho,)  laid  claim  to  a  remote 
antiquity.  Hence  the  translators  of  the  Pentateuch  into 
Greek  might  be  led  to  augment  the  amount  of  the  genera- 
tions by  the  centenary  additions,  and  by  the  interpolation  of 
the  second  Oainan,  in  order  to  carry  back  the  epochs  of  the 
creation  and  of  the  flood  to  a  period  more  conformable  with 
the  high  pretensions  of  the  Egyptians  and  Chaldseans."  And 
the  manner  in  which  the  thing  is  done,  witnesses  to  such  a 
procedure.  Deliberation  is  manifest.  The  very  regularity 
of  the  scheme  is  sufficient  to  bring  it  under  strong  suspicion 
of  contrivance.  Allusion  is  particularly  had  to  the  centenary 
additions  and  deductions.  —  On  this  latter  side  of  the  chrono- 
logical question  you  may  find  something  noteworthy  in 


404     THE    COMMON    CHRONOLOGT   MAY   BE   RETAINED. 

Clinton's  Fasti  Hellenici,  pp.  283-297 ;  and  specially  so  in 
Brown's  Ordo  Scedorum,  pp.  318-354. 

After  weighing  the  arguments  in  behalf  both  of  the  longer 
and  shorter  Chronologies,  we  feel  inclined  to  adhere  to  the 
latter,  that  is,  the  Usherian  or  Hebrew,  if,  so  soon  after  the 
Flood  as  four  hundred  and  twenty-seven  years,  (the  era, 
according  to  it,  of  the  call  of  Abraham,)  we  can  rationally 
account  for  such  multiplication,  spread,  and  settlement  of 
Noah's  posterity,  as  authentic  history,  relative  to  those  times, 
leads  us  to  believe  then  prevailed. 

Allow  us  then  to  submit  (in  briefest  form)  the  three  fol- 
lowing considerations,  and  to  ask  whether  these,  if  duly 
revolved  in  the  mind,  may  not  be  deemed  enough  to  satisfy 
any  reasonable  inquirer  in  relation  to  this  matter.  First  — 
After  referring  you  to  what  was  said  on  the  Twenty-sixth 
Evening,  concerning  the  number  to  which  the  offspring  of  our 
postdiluvian  progenitor  must  have  amounted  at  the  close  of 
the  first  century  after  the  deluge  —  we  would  remark,  that, 
in  the  interval  between  the  flood  and  the  call  of  Abraham,  so 
long  with  parental  pairs  did  the  process  of  procreation  con- 
tinue —  from  one  hundred  to  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  — 
and  from  protracted  life  so  many  generations  would  become, 
so  to  speak,  contemporaneous,  that  Noah's  descendants,  at  the 
close  of  that  interval,  must  have  attained  to  great  numerical 
magnitude — far  greater  than  persons,  if  they  lose  sight  of 
these  two  circumstances,  would  at  all  imagine.  Second — 
Let  readers  be  on  their  guard  against  being  deceived  by 
terms.  What,  pray,  for  the  most  part,  were  cities,  kingdoms, 
nations,  then  ?  Should  they  be  conceived  of  after  a  modern 
fashion  —  the  same  ideas  precisely  be  attached  —  would  not 
great  error  be  the  consequence  ?  Consider  that  each  small 
tribe  or  group  had  a  head  or  chief  to  whom  was  applied  the 
title  of  king :  thus,  king  of  Sodom,  king  of  Gomorrah,  king  of 
Admah,  king  of  Zeboiim,  Gen.  14:  2.  Look  at  Josh.  12: 
9-24,  and  you  will  see  that,  in  the  small  land  of  Canaan, 


A   FREQUENT    ERROR    IN   TABLES.  405 

there  were,  so  late  as  in  the  "days  of  Joshua,  no  less  than 
thirty-one  kings  and  so  many  kingdoms.  Look  at  the  size 
and  military  force  [of  the  early  kingdoms,  in  the  light  of 
Gen.  14.  Canaan,  from  its  fertility  and  situation,  may  be 
believed  to  have  been  as  well,  if  not  better,  stored  with 
inhabitants  than  any  of  the  neighboring  provinces,  when 
Abraham  and  Lot  first  came  into  it  ;  yet,  though  they 
were  possessed  of  considerable  flocks  and  herds,  which  soon 
became  so  large  as  to  render  it  impracticable  for  them 
to  dwell  together,  yet,  when  separated,  they  experienced 
no  difficulty  about  finding  a  plenty  of  vacant  room  both  for 
their  families  and  their  living  substance.  Third — We  are 
liable  to  harbor  misconception  respecting  the  amount  of  event 
and  change  occurring  in  a  given  period,  say  from  one  to  four 
or  five  centuries.  It  is  much  greater  than  is  ordinarily  con-^ 
ceived.  Just  think,  for  example,  that  in  the  United  States  of 
America,  the  first  permanent  settlement  took  place  in  A.  D. 
1609  — not  quite  two  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago.  This 
idea  is  finely  illustrated  in  that  passage  from  Kazwini,  cited 
by  us  on  the  Sixteenth  Evening. 

We  have  said  the  call  of  Abraham  was  four  hundred  and 
twenty-seven  years  after  the  flood.  It  is  needful  to  note  this, 
inasmuch  as  many  of  the  printed  tables  of  genealogies 
would  make  the  date  sixty  years  less  —  which  is  an  error. 
Abraham  was  seventy-five  years  old  when,  in  compliance 
with  the  divine  call,  he  left  Mesopotamia  for  Canaan,  (Gen. 
12:  4.)  By  subtracting  this  seventy-five  from  four  hundred 
and  twenty-seven,  you  fix  the  birth  of  Abraham  at  three 
hundred  and  fifty-two,  post  diluvium ;  but  the  tables  alluded 
to  fix  it  at  two  hundred  and  ninety-two  —  a  mistake  arising 
out  of  the  erroneous  assumption  that  Abraham,  because  first 
named,  was  the  eldest  son  of  Terah,  and  born  when  the  father 
was  seventy  years  old,  (Gen.  11 :  26.)  But  as  Terah  died 
at  the  age  of  two  hundred  and  five,  (Gen.  11 :  32,)  and  was 
deceased  when  Abraham  departed  for  Canaan,  (compare  11: 


406  ANTEDILUVIAN   LONGEVITY. 

32,  and  12:  4,)  by  subtracting  seventy-five  from  two  hundred 
and  five,  you  have  one  hundred  and  thirty  as  the  age  of 
Terah  when  his  son  Abraham  was  born,  i.  e.,  sixty  years 
below  the  seventy  which  those  tables  assign  as  the  period  of 
Abraham's  birth.  You  thus  see  the  correctness  of  our  asser- 
tion concerning  the  true  era  of  the  call  of  Abraham. 

According  to  the  Hebrew  computation,  Abraham,  then, 
was  born  Anno  Mundi  1656+352=2008 ;  and  being  born 
three  hundred  and  fifty-two  years  subsequent  to  the  deluge, 
Noah's  departure  out  of  the  world  (occurring  three  hundred 
and  fifty  years  posterior  to  the  Flood,  Gen.  9  :  28)  took 
place  but  two  years  prior  to  Abraham's  entrance  into  it ;  and 
when  our  patriarch  was  nine  hundred  and  fifty  years  old. 
(Gen.  9  :  29.) 

What  an  age  !  and  for  a  postdiluvian  too !  you  may  ex- 
claim. Six  hundred  of  those  years,  however,  were  passed 
as  an  antediluvian ;  for  there  is  this  peculiarity  about  Noah 
and  the  seven  other  souls  that  were  ferried  over  the  waters 
—  that  they  lived  in  two  worlds,  and  served  as  a  link 
between  the  two.  Yes ;  nearly  two-thirds  of  Noah's  nine 
hundred  and  fifty  years  he  spent  as  an  antediluvian,  and 
brought  his  longiaeval  constitution  indeed  from  beyond  the 
Flood.  No  one  beside  who  has  died  since  the  deluge,  at- 
tained to  near  so  great  age  as  he. 

Antediluvian  longevity  has,  in  every  postdiluvian  age, 
been  a  source  of  wonder ;  and  it  has  fallen  to  our  lot  to  hear 
some  curious  conjectures  respecting  it.  So  strange  has  the 
Mosaic  account,  pertaining  to  that  matter,  appeared  to  num- 
bers, that  they  have  been  induced  to  imagine  those  antedilu- 
vian years  could  not  have  been  of  equal  length  with  ours  — 
that  they  must  have  been  not  solar  but  lunar  years,  i.  e. 
months.  This  conjecture  however  is  untenable,  as  may  be 
perceived  by  the  extreme  absurdity  of  its  making  antediluvi- 
an parentage  to  commence  in  perfect  childhood — at  from 
the  age  of  sixty-five  to  one  hundred  and  eighty-seven  months, 


POSTDILUVIAN   REDUCTION    OF   TERM    OP    LIFE.        407 

as  may  be  seen  by  casting  the  eye  over  the  fifth  chapter  of 
Genesis. 

Others,  discerning  the  untenableness  of  that  idea,  have 
imagined  the  comparatively  few  instances  of  longevity  of 
which  the  record  makes  mention,  to  constitute  nearly  or  quite 
all  the  cases  of  the  kind  that  occurred  in  early  times  —  that 
the  population  generally  attained  no  such  great  age.  To 
this  there  are  two  objections  :  First — The  idea  has  nothing 
in  the  record  to  sustain  it.  The  small  number  of  generations  of 
Cain's  posterity  before  the  Noachic  deluge,  as  indicated  in  the 
fourth  chapter  of  Genesis,  appears  to  warrant  the  inference  that 
they  attained  to  similar  longevity  with  those  of  the  Sethite 
line  spoken  of  in  the  fifth  chapter.  Second — The  supposi- 
tion involves  a  palpably  miraculous  distinction  wrought  in 
favor  of  the  few  longiseval  over  the  many  breviseval  antedilu- 
vians, for  which  no  adequate  or  appropriate  final  cause  is 
either  suggested  by  Scripture  ^or  to  be  detected  by  reason. 

After  the  Deluge  there  was  a  considerably  rapid  progres- 
sive reduction  of  the  term  of  human  life,  as  the  sacred  history 
assures  us.  This  progress  may  be  divided  into  stages  or 
periods.  Thus,  the  first  reduction  began  with  Shem,  who 
lived  six  hundred  years;  the  second  with  Arphaxad,  who 
lived  four  hundred  and  thirty-eight  years  ;  the  third  reduction 
with  Peleg,  who  lived  two  hundred  and  thirty-nine  years. 
Thence  there  appeared  a  more  gradual  decline,  until  our  long 
existing  standard  of  threescore  years  and  ten  was  reached. 

Should  it  be  inquired  whether  any,  and  if  any  what,  as- 
signable physical  causes  existed  in  antediluvian  times,  tend- 
ing to  the  so  extraordinary  prolongation  of  human  life,  it 
might  be  replied  that  conjecture  has  assigned  the  operation  of 
the  two  following :  First  —  A  more  temperate  dietetic  regi- 
men, consisting  largely  in  the  absence  of  animal  food  and  of 
intoxicating  beverages.  Second — In  an  evenness  of  tem- 
perature peculiar  to  the  antediluvian  age  —  arising,  as  Dr. 
Burnet  thought,  from  the  axis  of  the  earth  being,  until  the 


408  HOW    TO    BE    ACCOUNTED    FOR. 

time  of  the  flood,  perpendicular  to  the  plane  of  the  ecliptic  — 
a  theory  which  the  learned  now  generally  regard  as  unsus- 
tainable. 

For  the  gradual  reduction  of  the  standard  of  life  after  the 
grand  cataclysm,  three  reasons  of  a  physical  nature  have 
been  set  forth  —  1st.  The  introduction  of  animal  food  and 
stimulating  beverages.  2d.  The  change,  in  reference  to  the 
plane  of  the  ecliptic,  of  the  earth's  axis  to  an  oblique  position. 
3d.  Malarious  influences  left  by  the  deluge  upon  its  retiring. 

It  is  our  belief  that  the  prolongation  or  reduction  of  the 
term  of  life  cannot  be  satisfactorily  accounted  for  by  a  refer- 
ence to  the  operation,  exclusively,  of  natural  principles  or 
secondary  causes.  We  think  it  necessary  to  have  recourse, 
additionally,  to  supernatural  influence  —  and  that  influence  of 
a  character  relaxing  or  intensifying,  according  to  the  stand- 
point proper  to  be  selected  from  which  to  survey  the  matter. 
If  from  the  standpoint  of  the  present  or  some  abridged  stand- 
ard of  human  life — then  supernatural  influence  is  to  be 
viewed  as  relaxing  the  law  of  mortality,  as  to  tensive  action 
in  the  early  ages  of  this  world's  history ;  —  if  from  the  stand- 
point of  the  longiaeval  term,  intensifying  that  law  as  to  its 
operation  :  This  order  of  proceeding  belonging  to  the  depart- 
ment of  God's  particular  providence  relative  to  man. 

The  final  cause  of  the  antediluvian  longevity  is  to  be  re- 
garded as  at  least  two-fold :  the  rapid  multiplication  of  man- 
kind, and  colonizing  of  the  earth;  and  the  invention  and 
advancement  of  the  useful  arts.  The  final  cause  or  causes 
of  the  postdiluvian  reduction,  in  the  different  degrees,  may 
be  viewed  as,  in  part,  the  preventing  of  the  human  species 
from  becoming  numerically  so  great  as  to  operate  injuriously 
to  human  character  and  welfare,  and  unfavorably  to  the 
divine  service  and  glory. 

Somewhere  have  we  seen  —  we  remember  not  where  — 
the  substance  of  the  following  paragraph :  After  the  creation, 
when  the  world  was  to  be  peopled  by  one  man  and  one  woman, 


LIFE    OP    THE    PATRIARCH,    HOW    EVENTFUL.  409 

the  age  of  the  greater  part  of  those  on  record  was  nine  hun- 
dred years  and  upwards.  But  after  the  flood,  when  there 
were  three  couples  to  repeople  the  earth,  none  of  the  patriarchs 
except  Shem  reached  the  age  of  five  hundred  years  ;  and 
only  the  first  three  of  this  line,  viz.,  Arphaxad,  Salah,  and 
Eber,  came  near  that  age,  —  which  was  in  the  first  century 
after  the  flood.  In  the  second  century,  we  do  not  find  that  any 
attained  the  age  of  two  hundred  and  forty  ;  and  in  the  third 
century,  none  except  Terah  arrived  at  two  hundred ;  by  which 
time  the  world  was  so  well  peopled,  that  they  had  built 
cities,  and  were  found  in  distinct  nations  under  their  respec- 
tive kings. 

If  the  fixed  standard  of  human  life  were  that  of  Methuse- 
lah's age,  or  even  that  of  Abraham's,  the  world  would  soon  be 
overstocked.  On  the  other  hand,  if  the  age  of  man  were 
limited  Nto  that  of  divers  other  animals  —  to  ten,  twenty,  or 
thirty  years  only  —  the  decay  of  mankind  would  then  be  too 
fast.  But  on  the  present  scale  the  balance  is  nearly  even, 
and  life  and  death  keep  an  equal  pace.  In  thus  maintaining, 
throughout  all  ages  and  places,  these  proportions  of  mankind, 
and  of  all  other  creatures,  God  declares  himself  to  be  indeed 
the  ruler  of  the  world. 

By  abbreviating  the  term  of  human  life  since  the  great  in- 
undation, the  Supreme  Being  has  shown  his  determination 
not  to  suffer  antediluvian  wickedness,  in  its  enormous  fla- 
grancies,  again  to  prevail,  nor  antediluvian  scenes  to  reap- 
pear. Those  evils  which  flowed  out  of  or  were  aggravated 
by  so  great  protraction  of  life,  the  Divine  Monarch  would 
not  have  to  exist  in  postdiluvian  times. 

How  eventful  a  life,  not  so  much  as  to  the  number  but 
magnitude  of  the  scenes  or  occurrences  which,  in  the  provi- 
dence of  God,  it  was  the  lot  of  our  postdiluvian  ancestor  to 
pass  through —  events,  a  portion  of  them  at  least,  partaking 
of  the  character  of  the  prominent  or  leading  ones  of  time  — 
events,  too,  in  which  he  would  never  have  borne  so  illustrious 
19 


410  WHAT   THE     MAGNITUDE    OF    THE    EVENTS. 

or  important  a  part,  had  it  not  been  that  early  after  his 
natural,  he  had  been  born  by  a  new  and  heavenly  birth.  As 
regards,  for  example,  his  position  relatively  to  the  inhabitants 
of  the  Old  "World,  he  would  never,  by  the  Ruler  over  all, 
have  been  selected  to  act  the  part  he  did  —  to  open  his  lips 
as  a  preacher  of  righteousness  —  to  essay  to  stem  the  torrent 
of  iniquity,  or  change  the  current  of  affairs  —  had  it  not  been 
for  that  peculiarity  of  the  age  —  his  piety.  How  superlative 
a  regard  was  his  for  the  glory  of  the  Infinite  One,  and  for  the 
well-being  (not  only  nor  so  much  in  the  lower  as  in  the  higher 
sense)  of  his  fellow-men.  How  intense  was  his  desire  for  a 
change  in  those  knit  to  him  by  a  common  humanity  and  de- 
scent, so  iniquity  should  not  be  their  ruin.  It  is  a  saying  of 
its  denizens,  that  "  Naples  is  a  piece  of  heaven  fallen  down 
to  earth."  Oh,  how  much  did  our  worthy  patriarch  long  for 
something  of  heaven  to  come  down  to  earth,  to  preserve  the 
latter  from  sinking  down  to  hell ;  but  the  Old  World  would 
not  have  it,  no,  not  so  good  a  specimen  even  as  Naples,  which 
you  will  all  say  is  none  of  the  best ;  and  so  the  flood  came 
and  bore  her  to  her  own  place.  Ah,  what  a  groan  was  that 
in  heaven,  when  the  first  big,  voluminous,  synchronal  wail  of 
its  new  tenants  ascended  from  the  awful,  bottomless  abyss  ! 

We  have  said  that  Noah  would  have  never  borne  the  trans- 
cendently  distinguished,  as  well  as  praiseworthy  part  he  did 
in  time's  earlier  events,  but  for  his  piety,  his  eminent  piety. 
This  is  specially  true  of  that  paramount  event  of  his  day,  the 
deluge.  But  for  this  peculiarity,  he,  with  the  multitudinous 
throng,  would  have  sunk  as  lead  beneath  the  mighty  waves, 
instead  of  being  the  chosen  instrument  of  ferrying  his  little 
family,  with  the  sub-human  creatures,  over  the  waters,  to 
stock  an  untenanted  world. 

How  grateful  should  we  feel  that  so  great,  wise,  and  good 
a  man  was  chosen  to  commence  the  colonizing  of  the  depopu- 
lated earth,  and  lay  the  foundation  of  her  institutions.  How 
long  since,  but  for  the  benign  effects,  upon  the  postdiluvian 


THE  PATRIARCH'S   INFLUENCE  411 

generations,  of  his  exertions  as  well  as  example  —  of  the 
shaping,  moulding  influence  of  his  instructions,  counsels,  kind 
ministries,  and,  withal,  many  and  fervent  prayers  —  might 
this  earth  in  toto  have  become  as  Sodom ;  have  experienced 
the  fiery  fate  of  Gomorrah.  Our  saint  and  sage  was  incom- 
parably more  useful  in  the  New  World  than  he  had  ever  suc- 
ceeded in  being  in  the  Old.  "What  gave  him  a  special  ad- 
vantage for  usefulness  among  the  postdiluvians  was,  that  he 
stood  at  their  head  —  was  the  parent  of  them  all ;  had  the 
opportunity  of  superintending  and  directing  the  course  of  the 
twig  in  its  up-risings,  and  the  fountain  in  its  out-flowings. 
He  indeed  fell  far  short  of  accomplishing  for  his  offspring 
all  that  his  benevolent  soul  desired.  Ere  he  left  the  world 
he  was  compelled  to  witness  upspringing  evils  which  ago- 
nized his  spirit  —  yes,  even  of  so  great  and  aggravated 
an  evil,  perhaps,  as  that  of  a  turning  of  the  hearts  of  some 
from  the  true  God  to  idols.  It  appears  at  least  that  ere 
Abraham  left  the  land  of  his  nativity,  the  sin  of  idolatry  was 
not  wholly  unknown  in  it.  (See  Josh.  24 :  2,  14.)  Be  this 
as  it  may,  our  postdiluvian  father  accomplished  for  his  de- 
scendants, instrumen tally,  an  inexpressible  amount  of  good. 
Yes,  much  as  there  is  in  the  world  to  be  deplored  —  far  as 
large  portions  of  humanity  are  from  what  it  is  highly  desira- 
ble they  should  be  —  still,  how  much  worse  both  as  to  char- 
acter and^condition  would  the  family  of  man  in  its  entireness 
have  been,  but  for  the  early  benign  ministries  of  our  great 
and  good  progenitor.  Eminently  may  it  be  declared  of  him,  that 
"  though  dead  he  yet  speaketh  ; "  though  long,  long  since,  out 
of  the  world,  he  left  and  sent  down  to  succeeding  generations, 
influences  salutary  and  precious  that  are  yet  in  it ;  aye,  and 
are  this  day  and  hour  widely,  as  well  as  strikingly,  visible. 
Would  that  all  the  intermediate  progenitors  of  the  present 
population  of  the  globe,  and  the  existing  population  itself,  had 
been  so  willing  to  be  profited  by,  as  to  be  more  like  him. 
Were  the  possession  of  grace  dependent  upon  generation, 


412  HOW   BENIGN   AND    LASTING. 

instead  of  regeneration,  its  prevalence  and  blessed  effects 
would  be  vastly  more  extensive  than  we  now  find  them. 

Noah's  spirit  has  been  long  mingling  with  the  glorified 
and  happy  of  the  spirit  world  —  beholding  sights  which 
angel  spirits  witness ;  engaged  in  their  elevated  and  rap- 
turous exercises  —  with  a  measure  of  peculiarity  indeed  as 
regards,  particularly,  the  latter ;  singing  some  strains  "which 
angel  voices  can  hardly  reach ;  harping  some  notes  which 
angel  harps  cannot  touch. 

Oh,  what  heights  of  glory  does  the  patriarch  spirit  already 
occupy!  his  intellect  how  expanded  and  how  stored!  his 
heart  how  crowded  and  swollen  with  big  and  blissful  emotions  ! 
but,  be  it  observed,  the  intellect  and  heart  of  that  spirit  have 
not  yet  attained  to  all  the  capacity  or  amount  of  choice  stores 
of  which  they  are  susceptible.  And,  when  will  they  ?  Echo 
answers,  When  will  they  ? 

Shall  our  spirits  immortal,  young  gentlemen,  ever  ascend 
and  approach  near  enough  to  this  patriarch-spirit,  not  only  to 
behold  but  have  converse  with  him,  our  honored  ancestor  ? 
Shall  we  have  addressed  to  us  any  of  the  utterances  of  his 
lips ;  receive  great  thoughts  from  his  into  our  minds ;  and 
have  any  of  the  more  choice  emotions  of  his  swelling  bosom 
reappearing  in  ours?  —  One  thing  we  do  know — that  if 
heaven's  golden  gates  ever  turn  on  their  hinges  for  our 
admittance,  our  eyes  shall  gaze  on  a  greater  than  Noah,  and 
one  that  has  done  more  for  Noah's  posterity,  than  that  excel- 
lent and  benevolent  patriarch  ever  did  for  them,  or  ever  had 
it  in  his  power  to  do :  One,  also,  wearing  the  whole  likeness 
of  humanity,  corporeal  as  well  as  spiritual.  For  though 
Noah's  spirit  is,  his  body  is  not  in  heaven.  It  is  here  — 
yes,  here.  Oh,  that  living  men  might  treat  it  better,  than 
upon  it  with  infidel,  contemptuous  foot  to  trample.  Yes,  the 
whole  of  the  second  father  of  mankind  ( is  not  absent  from  our 
terrestrial  abode.  Though,  some  thousands  of  years  since, 
all  belonging  to  our  patriarch,  that  was  just  ready  for  it, 


HIS    MEMORIAL    WITH   TJS.  413 

passed  from  the  shores  of  time  to  a  territory  that  by  time's 
foot  is  never  trodden ;  yet  he  left  behind  him  a  memorial — 
a  physical,  visible  memorial.  He  left  behind  him  that  body 
which,  for  so  prolonged  a  season,  housed  his  spirit ;  those  lips 
which  had  uttered  the  words  of  instruction,  tones'  of  admoni- 
tion, notes  of  warning,  which  fell  upon  the  ears  of  the  ungodly 
of  the  world  beyond  the  flood's  rolling  waves ;  those  hands 
which  were  employed  in  the  construction  of  the  floating 
house  that  transported  the  prime  tenants  of  the  new  from  a 
former  world.  Yes,  young  friends,  we  may  with  our  own 
eyes  have  seen  some  portion  of  the  outer  garment  which 
Noah's  spirit  wore.  And,  oh,  does  not  the  very  dust  appear 
to  us  the  more  attractive  and  dear,  when  we  think  that  some 
of  it,  falling  upon  our  eye-sight,  helped  to  constitute  the 
mantle,  the  fleshy  robe,  worn  by  so  great  and  holy  men  as 
our  Patriarch,  and  Abraham,  and  Moses,  and  David,  and  the 
prophets,  yea,  and  by  the  apostles  of  our  Lord,  and  hundreds 
and  thousands,  and  millions  too,  all  of  Noah's  progeny,  of 
whom  the  world  was  not  worthy?  Yes,  the  very  dust  of 
earth  is  endeared,  when  we  think  of  this ;  —  and  especially 
when,  in  addition,  we  think  that  this  very  dust  may  again 
help  to  enrobe  those  saints  in  glory ;  —  this  very  dust  become 
instinct  with  life,  become  immortal ;  stand  in  organized,  em- 
bodied form  before  the  throne  of  the  Infinite  Majesty ;  and 
appear  beautiful  beyond  all  that  mortal  vision  has  ever 
beheld ;  and  continue  so,  aye,  pass  on  from  the  beautiful  to 
the  more  beautiful,  from  glory  to  glory,  unintermittedly, 
without  end !  We  bless  thee  this  hour,  O  Infinite,  for  the 
information  thou  hast  given,  that  the  mortal  shall  become 
immortal  —  so  that  our  pious  ancestry,  in  the  habiliments 
which  once  they  wore,  shall  be  seen  by  us  —  those  whom  we 
knew  on  this  earthly  ball  again  seen  by  us,  —  but  habiliments 
renewed,  indeed,  and  appearing  superior  far  to  what  they 
were  when  they  constituted  the  apparel  of  the  saints  wearing 
them,  ere  they  were  put  off. 


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